No Backing Out Once Inside
by Animegoil
Summary: Being convinced by Lavi to go to a brothel acquaints Kanda with the demon of the house, Allen Walker. However, this one-night stand evolves into something more as Allen proves key to Kanda and Lavi's goals and the hunting of a certain someone. KxA ARK
1. Reception

**Because an incredibly brilliant person decided to profit out of this fandom's obsession with making Allen a girl why not a prostitute? Still male, however. Since when is Kanda straight, after all? This is for that person, and everyone else who knows Allen tops from the bottom. **

**Warnings: if being in a brothel reception hall discomfits you, take your leave. It doesn't go any further than that, however. AllenxKanda, hints of LavixKanda. **

**Enjoy**

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_**There's no backing out once inside- **_

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The place, Kanda thinks, is remarkably clean and tastefully furnished. He supposes he ought to give Lavi credit for knowing him so well—agreeing to go with Lavi on this excursion does not necessarily mean he will actually go through with the act for which the excursion is for; Kanda will take any excuse offered to back out of it, and Lavi is being very careful not to give him one.

In fact, Lavi has done too well, because it's hard for Kanda to feel uncomfortable or irritable at the Japanese theme of the brothel house. The walls are wooden with traditional doors and beautiful scrolls and ink paintings adorn the walls. The tables in the reception are low and decorated with simple, elegant designs, the tasseled cushions look comfortable and plush, and the atmosphere is quiet and relaxed. There is, however, a Western-style sofa with chairs and a higher table before it, and a small bar with just enough space for a scant four people to sit at, but the style matches that of the rest of the establishment and is situated to the side—clearly a tactful addition for those who preferred their habitual culture.

"Nice place, huh, Yuu?" Lavi grins impudently, strolling in as if they are merely at the marketplace to pick up a cartoon of eggs and cheese. Kanda rolls his eyes and doesn't give him the pleasure of an agreeable answer, but knows Lavi will read it nevertheless.

"Ray, how are you!" Lavi waves to the host, standing graciously behind the main counter, and to Kanda's surprise, the tight-lipped man breaks out into a smile. Kanda feels a twinge of wariness at this man's ready acceptance of Lavi.

"Master Lavi, how are you today?" he peers behind him and looks Kanda over with a masterful glance, "Is he with you tonight?"

"Not like that, obviously, or we wouldn't be here," Lavi laughs at his own joke, and Kanda is gratified by the slim, if humoring, eyebrow the man raises at his words. Lavi continues in his usual oblivion to other people's reactions, "I fought tooth and nail to get him to come with me. What we have here," he gestures for Kanda to come over, and he does, reluctantly, for Lavi to throw an arm over his shoulder, "is a newbie!"

Kanda pushes the arm off furiously and refuses to meet the host's eyes, snapping out with irritation, "Lavi! Watch it, or I'm leaving," he doesn't care if there is a mild blush heating his cheeks at Lavi's cheeky revelation, but he did forget to threaten Lavi with imminent death, which he regrets deeply.

The host smiles serenely as if there had been a wall between them and he'd not heard a word, "That is quite alright. We do have a small procedure for our first-time customers, to ensure maximum satisfaction. It is only an evaluation."

Kanda doesn't like procedures, or time wasting, and he gives Lavi a withering glare to assure him that if this takes too long, he will not hesitate in turning and going straight back home.

"May I have you name, Master?"

"Kanda Yuu," he snaps.

"Master Kanda," Kanda finds himself mollified by the man's discerning of how to address him, despite the fact he gave his name out in eastern order, "Our goal is to match you with someone who will fulfill your needs and remain compatible, that is all."

"So you have a _pleasurable_ evening, Yuu," Lavi croons, and Kanda shoots him a dirty look. Imminent death is coming, he assures him silently, whether he's been warned or not.

The host, with his impeccably groomed stiff mustache and starched white clothes, steps behind the counter to properly look at Kanda. Kanda curses the fact that he's wearing form-fitting clothes today, because the man's gaze pauses to study each of his muscles, lingering at his thighs, continuing to his arm muscles and gracefully curving neck, and finally ends with a scrutinizing gaze at his face, where a nervous tick is twitching at the corner of his mouth in irritation and discomfiture.

"You are clearly a man with much strength, and I will be sure to provide you with someone who will not break easily. Do you prefer them submissive or more aggressive?"

Kanda begins to blush spectacularly, though the process is thankfully stopped by his having to pin Lavi with his most lethal kind of glare when the redhead bursts out laughing. Several seconds pass, while Kanda ponders the question, the host watches with a hint of amusement, and Lavi leans against the counter as his laughs echo inside the reception area.

"He likes them spunky," Lavi finally breathes, clutching his sides as they continue to shake in near-silent laughter, "If they're meek, he'll just disassociate himself from them and get lost in his thoughts. He needs someone who will rile him up and keep him in the _now_."

Kanda is at first ready to lash out with a growl at Lavi's ill-mannered habit of speaking for other people, but then he realizes with a strange twist of his gut that Lavi has hit the proverbial nail on the head.

It makes him vastly uncomfortable that Lavi knows him well enough to surmise such a private revelation. In fact, it is something Kanda had not consciously realized until now. It is… troubling to have someone able to read him so easily.

"I understand," the host says slowly, and then clears his throat, turning around to shuffle some papers, "Master Kanda," he begins conversationally, "How do you like our accommodations?"

Kanda assumes he means the reception area—the decoration and furniture and whatnot.

"It's nice," he grunts.

The host smiles cunningly, and Kanda gets the sudden impression that there was more to that question than it seemed, "I see."

"I thought it'd be right up his alley," Lavi chimes in and then pouts, "By the way, I'm getting a night too, just so you know."

"I would never assume otherwise," the man chuckles, "Miranda?"

Lavi smiles happily, "Good girl, I was worried she'd be taken, but she kept her promise to stay free tonight for me after all."

"You are a very valued customer," the man bows slightly, "As you well know, she is reserved almost exclusively for you."

"Hope you don't miss her too much when I buy her from you," Lavi winked.

"On the contrary, we will all wish you the best."

Kanda watches the exchange with a slight frown, and wonders why he'd not noticed that Lavi had a girl. It is surprisingly hard to know what goes on through his mind, even when all he does is spout words impulsively. He wonders if the news bother him, and can't say a definitive 'no', but can't quite admit 'yes', then.

"In any case, Master Lavi, her room is ready, so you may step up at any moment," he turns to Kanda with a wry look, "Our facilities are all top-notch—each room is sound proof, so that is never a problem, and has an adjoining bathroom with a hot tub, and a private dressing room. There are extra towels, sheets, and a drawer with props for your enjoyment. Food and drink is provided as well. Should you ever need assistance of any kind, or find yourself displeased with our choice, there is a bell near the doorway. Your escort will explain in detail anything you wish to have clarified—"

"Did you find someone for him, then?" Lavi asked, eager to know.

"I believe I have someone who will meet Master Kanda's needs," the man says, making a great show of reading through the list of available hosts. Lavi seems to be just barely able to contain his impatient curiosity; Kanda couldn't care less, but he realizes something.

"Hey," he says, and Lavi looks at him. Kanda pauses and tries to figure out how to say this, "You are seeing… a woman?"

He realizes that Lavi can take this question and interpret it many different ways—subtle inquiry about this Miranda he's seeing, questioning of Lavi's back-and-forth preferences, surprise at finding a woman here that he's developed a relationship with, tacit inquisition about not being told that he'd had someone else this whole time, or one of the myriad of other possible implications his statement could have.

Lavi blinks once, and then grins; Kanda would not have expected any less of him—especially now that he's realized just how well Lavi knows him, "Don't worry, you didn't think I asked for a woman for you, did you? They have both here."

Kanda turns away and pretends to read the scrolls hanging on the wall. He has no idea when Lavi made those arrangements, but he supposes he'd been stupid in the first place for doubting Lavi. Not that he'll admit that to him.

"Ah," the host rests his finger on a particular name on the list in front of him, and he looks up with a slight smile, "Master Kanda, I believe you will be very pleased with our pick. I am certain you two will have a very satisfactory night. Your temperaments will mix… quite interestingly."

Kanda doesn't know whether that's a good thing or not, and frowns deeply. Lavi places both hands on the table and attempts to read the list upside down, but the host casually slides his fingers over the name.

"Who? C'mon, tell me!" he whines, and Kanda wishes he'd grow up.

"Allen Walker."

Lavi gasps, "No _way_! Ooh, Kanda, you're in for a rough night. I've heard nightmares about him," he smirks slyly, "But Ray's right— I think you'll be mighty pleased tomorrow, even as you come downstairs limping."

Kanda narrows his eyes, "What does that mean, exactly?"

Lavi laughs and skips backwards, dancing his way up the stairs, "You'll see what I mean. But he's a good one— he'll keep you on your toes. Saucy guy, I hear."

Kanda frowns, beginning to regret his decision, but the smirk Lavi regards him with is clearly a challenge, and Kanda isn't about to pass that up.

"Alright, well, where is he?" he doesn't temper the impatience in his voice.

The host reaches in a drawer and holds up a key, which Kanda is about to swipe when loud, tramping footsteps are heard coming down the stairs.

"Ray, you bastard! I told you I didn't want that last guy coming ever again! It took me _forever_ to wash the stink off me!"

He's a small boy; _moyashi_, Kanda's mind supplies absently, because it's too engrossed in observing the angry, hypnotizing pivot of the kid's hips. He wears a vaguely oriental-looking outfit—baggy, low-set pants that hang off the shapely curve of the kid's hips, oddly womanly ones. The well-muscled abdomen that preens above those hips is unmistakably a male's, however, exposed by the black, midriff-baring tank top he's wearing. It looks like a woman's sport bra, Kanda sneers mentally, but only mentally, because the boy's body is brimming with health and the muscles shift smoothly underneath his skin, particularly those of his shoulders and chest, marvelously sculpted like those statues he's seen in Rome. The outfit is completed by the flat oriental shoes that cradle his diminutive feet and expose sinewy ankles. His face is young and pale, with an intricate red tattoo adorning the left half of his face above and below his eye. He reminds Kanda of the moon: pale skin, snow-white hair that frames his face and swishes back and forth across his neck with each of his steps, and his eyes— they are _silver,_ round orbs that flash with unrestrained vivacity. Kanda vaguely hopes Allen Walker is as… appealing as this boy is.

"That's why you will get eighty percent of the profits as opposed to merely half," the man says smoothly. That appears to settle the kid's ruffled feathers, and he huffs once. He catches Kanda's wide-eyed gaze on his hips, and Kanda _swears_ he sees a smirk on the kid's face just as he turns away. The movement _coincidentally_ makes the hem of his pants slip lower so that a curl of white hair shows, almost indiscernible against the timid white skin of his pelvis, and Kanda's assumption that the white hair is dyed is disproved.

"Fine, then, but never again. My arms are sore from holding him away. He must weigh three hundred pounds, easy," he sighs, rotating his shoulder as he massages it, and adds with a vicious smile, "I hope he can't walk for the next three days. Don't think I'll ever beat that time it was seven days, though, remember that one?" he snickers a bit in remembrance, and Kanda pales slightly at this… _demon_, and feels sorry for his next victim. The demon, however, sways slightly as he touches his temple, and leans heavily on the counter, "And I want a ton of food to eat with my next client. I'm _starving_."

Ray clears his throat succinctly, eyes darting toward Kanda, and the boy 'eeps' and immediately straightens himself with wide eyes. Kanda is abruptly aware of the situation and realizes much too late that he's taken a step backward.

"I don't want this demon kid," he states firmly. The boy eyes him weirdly, but doesn't appear particularly insulted.

The host pretends he didn't hear him, "Master Kanda, this is Allen Walker, your escort for tonight."

"I don't want a kid," he repeats, and thinks, not quite consciously, _I don't want someone who will challenge my authority_.

The host raises an eyebrow, "I have a feeling you will be pleased with my choice. I have yet to fail in finding my customers the perfect match. Should you be displeased at any point in the night, I will immediately find you a replacement at no cost. Allen will only take as much as he is given."

"I'm a nice guy, honest," the kid pipes up, nodding. He appears vaguely amused by the fierce resistance in Kanda's eyes, and Kanda can imagine that he's already thinking up of devious, malignant ways to make this as painful as possible.

"He's… a _kid_," Kanda tries the last excuse he has in his arsenal, because Lavi will never forgive him if he backs out of this otherwise, "What if… he gets hurt?"

The kid's eyes flash dangerously at that point, and his chest swells in indignation. He takes a step closer, gait swaggering with a very tantalizing lilt that catches Kanda's eye and doesn't let go.

"What, you think I'm not up to it? That I'm some delicate, inexperienced little kid?" there is a dare gleaming in those silver eyes, and he closes the scant feet between them in two smooth strides that take Kanda's breath away. He starts when the kid's hand cups his and presses it low to his bare stomach, heat scalding his fingertips as he feels the tight muscles underneath the skin that shifts with every breath. The kid stands on his tiptoes to breathe airily _just_ at the shell of Kanda's ear. Then, he drags Kanda's hand lower, forces his fingertips to push _just_ past the hem of his pants— and _just_ at that moment, makes a low, heavy, guttural little moan that warms Kanda's ear and weighs against the pit of his stomach.

"Still think I won't be able to satisfy you?" he whispers as he draws back, eyes full of mischief and unspoken promises as he lets his lingering touch laugh for him.

There's no backing out, Kanda realizes, with with less dismay than he'd have thought.

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**First fic I've written, though once I gather enough little drabbles I'll put those up as well. Support the writers of fics you like review!**


	2. Main Attraction

**This is actually going to develop a plot, and I just want to thank every one for the encouraging reviews!  
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**Warnings: If near sex situations bother you, despite the fact that pants remain on, please leave. Otherwise:  
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**Enjoy!**

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_**There's no backing out once Inside- 2  
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Kanda is beginning to think that if _this_ is how the rest of the night is going to go, he might as well actually back out. He gives a disgusted huff and turns away from the boy in front of him scarfing down everything on the table. And when he says table, he really means three tables. They are both sitting cross-legged on the floor across from each other, but Kanda has been done with his tempura for fifteen minutes now. The kid, however, still has three plates left, and is about to accomplish what Kanda had initially believed impossible. He doesn't see where it all _goes_—the kid hasn't exploded, but it's all in there, _somehow_. He would be amazed if he wasn't so disgusted by the huge mess.

The kid, Allen Walker, finally sighs, and Kanda glances in time to catch him leaning back, one hand behind him for support, the other on his stomach.

"I feel so much better now," he warbles contentedly, eyes closed in relaxation. He opens one of them to pin a silver one-eyed gaze on Kanda and pout mildly, "Are you sure you had enough? You only had one dish."

"That's more than enough," Kanda growls, making sure his displeasure gets through. Allen frowns slightly, but it seems to be in more of a 'suit yourself' way than an affronted one. Kanda's glare deepens, "Is that all I came here for? So that you can stuff yourself and then fall asleep like a three-year-old?"

_Now_ the frown becomes insulted, and Allen huffs angrily and crosses his arm, "I'm the professional here," he says haughtily, "I know exactly what I'm doing. Besides," he adds with an exaggerated grimace, looking down at his milky-skinned, muscled abdomen, "I can't work on an empty stomach."

"Can you work at all?" Kanda snaps, and reaches with one hand to feel the comforting, violence-calming hilt of his sword, before remembering that it's on a pillow near the doorway.

Allen abruptly shoves all the plates from the table, and they crash to the floor, miraculously unbroken, but sauces spills and bits of remaining food mush against the lush forest-green carpet. Kanda freezes, more out of surprise at the sudden outburst, and raises an eyebrow.

"Would you stop doubting me?" Allen snarls, silver eyes flashing in indignation and irritation, and Kanda watches him as if in slow motion. The kid gets on the table, his two lusciously pale arms gripping Kanda's edge of the table, and then raising one knee, then the other, until he sits back to kneel on the table. His knees are spread apart in an alluring beckon Kanda finds his resolve struggling to resist. He has the height advantage now, and with a hot breath trailing from the corner of Kanda's jaw, right below his ear, all the way to the corner of his mouth, he makes full use of it. Kanda closes his eyes when he feels those small hands wrap around his neck and pull him down, and then legs are brought forward to wrap securely around his waist, pressing their hips together in an entirely too suggestive manner, and Kanda hears a deliciously throaty moan that he never realizes is his own. He feels the smirk against his lips, however, and feels a tongue dash between his lips like a cat lapping up morsels of taste. He's been pulled to lay on top of Allen on the table, his lithe, small body arching up to tantalize and make it harder for Kanda to breathe.

Kanda takes it back—yes, he _can_ work, and damn well, and it's not long before he slips his arms underneath the small body and lifts him up, strong legs curling even tighter around his hips so that Kanda sways for a moment as pressure floods his groin and he sucks air from Allen's mouth with his gasp. The heat filling him is contagious and insidious, warming the air around them degree by degree and making their hands clench against each other's clothes before continuing their pleasure-seeking roving.

They stumble to the bed in a tangle, neither willing to let go for more than a couple seconds, so they end up tossing the pillows aside with their bodies, and Kanda somehow manages to pull the covers back with one hand while Allen licks the side of his exposed neck, tongue flicking upward to graze behind his ear, and whimpers a little in his throat when Kanda presses him harder against him.

He doesn't think it was meant to progress this quickly, but Allen is relentless and groans a little every time he widens his mouth to deepen the kiss. His tongue is a mound of fire that tickles the roof of his mouth and traces the lines on the inside of his cheek and he fights for control and after a couple seconds of pushing and shoving in wet, slick and warm, he breaks through into the boy's mouth, announcing his triumph by pressing his nails against his chest. The kid won't take that, growls and tears his mouth away, coming out panting and chest heaving, and Kanda realizes belatedly that he too is slightly lightheaded, whether from lack of air or from the inexplicable heat between his legs that hurts with urgency.

It's the scent of clovers, it's the slight dampness in the roots of his moon-white hair that Kanda runs his fingers through, it's the feel of fingers skittering along his chest as they fumble urgently to unbutton his shirt, the growls from their throats, the mumbled curses—it all sets Kanda's blood on fire in a way he doesn't remember ever having experienced before. He rolls his shoulders to allow Allen to pull his shirt away, and is about to close the distance between them to bite his neck, where he sees his Adam's apple beckoning with its bobbing every time the kid swallows a moan and breathes heavily. The kid's movements, however, still suddenly, and Kanda's eyes widen as he realizes what he's looking at with such interest.

"What is that?" Allen whispers, running hot fingers along Kanda's chest, and the man hisses and draws back, covering the now-exposed tattoo with splayed fingers.

"Nothing," he snarls, and the mood is broken for a moment, but their chests are still heaving, and a lock of hair falls from Kanda's faultlessly secured ponytail, obscuring his view.

Allen frowns and shrugs, pointing at his own face, where the intricate crimson tattoo darkens the left side of his face, "I was just wondering if it was like mine," he says nonchalantly, and then gives Kanda a side glance that hardly hides his furtive smirk, "Is that it? Is that all you came here for? So you can get coy and chicken out?" he purrs, and Kanda irritably recognizes the parallel to his own words earlier.

"Of course not, _moyashi_," he mocks, uncaring of whether the kid knows what he's calling him or not, and lunges. He's on the kid in a second, shoving him against the mattress, and biting his shoulder fiercely, relishing in the surprised cry he draws out. He sucks in his breath and almost cries out when the response is a well-deserved dragging of claws along his now unprotected back. He hisses, pressing one palm along the small bulge of Allen's food-laden stomach, and relishes the nausea that glazes the kid's eyes and makes the pressure of his nails relent on his back.

"Careful," he murmurs in the boy's ear, twirling a strand of white hair that he admires distantly for its silkiness, "I'm the one paying here," actually, Lavi is, but the point is the same. Kanda is in control, and he won't let this demon boy have the better of him, "And I better get my money's worth."

All Allen does, however, is laugh, as if what Kanda said is actually funny. Kanda is about to comment, when Allen slips out from underneath him and shoves him backwards on the mattress, faster than Kanda can properly react to, reflexes only leading him to cover his face with one arm and to grab the kid with the other to hold him back. There's no need to, however, because Allen is simply lying between Kanda's spread legs, though that in itself is painful for Kanda, the pressure of his weight on the center of his hips speeding his breaths into breathy pants. Allen's palms are flat on Kanda's smooth abdomen, fingertips flexing deliciously while the kid's tongue—Kanda releases a low, shuddering moan and trembles, because the kid's tongue is fiery and slick and lapping at the nearly indiscernible sheen of sweat on Kanda's stomach, making his muscles contract when he dips into his belly button and Kanda grits his teeth and doesn't care that he's leaving crescent marks on the sides of Allen's face as it's all he can do to hold back from crying out.

"Beg me to stop," Allen dares with a devious, knowing grin, his breath tickling Kanda's damp skin, his fingers moving to begin easing off the hem of his pants.

"Shut up!" Kanda scowls, though his voice shakes and breaks in the middle when Allen presses his thumb against the inside of his pelvis. This is enough.

He sits up and pushes Allen to his rightful place—below him, using his full body weight to keep him pinned as he nips the boy's pale earlobe, breathes against his collarbone, and lets his hands dig into the boy's lower abdomen. Each twist of his wrists, steadily going lower and lower, pulls a thread of a whimper from Allen's mouth, until his face is flushed red and the first bead of sweat shows up on the side of his temple. Kanda leans forward and licks it off, straddling the boy to better keep his writhing in check. The heat between them is unbearable, rushing the adrenaline along his veins like it's on the verge of exploding, and he feels that if he doesn't do something drastic soon, it might.

He goes for the boy's mouth again, not caring whether he chokes him or not, only needing, _needing_ and wanting, and touching and craving. His sweat is a drug, his face a beacon, his whimpers a call, and he wants to answer. He bites and pulls at his lower lip, and Allen makes him shudder by tracing teasing patterns on the roof of his mouth, even as he cries out when Kanda retaliates by shoving their hips roughly together, though he has to bite back his own gasp.

"I'll…" Allen's chest heaves, breaths fluttering Kanda's now disheveled bangs, "I'll make you… pay for this, you'll see."

It's a promise Kanda's eager to see fulfilled, but he only bites his shoulder in response, and smirks at Allen's pretty flushed face.

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**Show some love for prostitute!Allen and review! **


	3. Afterglow

**So, now there is a plot, so I will be changing the summary accordingly. Btw, this still happens around early 1900's, same as D.gray Man actually does. There is now obvious LavixKanda. Because I can't get enough of those three. And I want to pimp yenaii's KandaxAllen fic It's not Because I Love you. It's quite interesting, give it a go.**

**Thank you for all the wonderful reviews. Glad you guys like it.  
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**Enjoy!**

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_**There's no backing out once Inside- Chapter 3  
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Kanda swims between the edges of consciousness and sleep for an indeterminable amount of time. He assumes it is morning, because one of his bare arms is bathed in warmth, while the other is cool, and attempts to gather the willpower to move, even as his body seems not his own, floating in vertigo. Then the bed creaks slightly, and Kanda's left side sinks a little, and there is a moment of clouded alarm when he realizes someone else is on the bed with him—Lavi?

Must be. Kanda wonders how rough they had it the night before, because he can't seem to feel his body at all. He feels no sharp pains, though, so either he didn't get injured, or Lavi has him doped up on morphine. That would explain the situation, Kanda muses, his mind's eye still swaying in the veneers of a dream and the callings of sleep. Strange that he can't remember an investigation or encounter the night before. It's possible too, that he hit his head and can't remember because of that.

"…What have you done?"

His inexplicable drowsiness isn't displaced at all, but definite confusion joins it, as well as the return of that clouded alarm—that isn't Lavi's voice at all. He pries his eyes open, and his mind reels when he meets a pair of silver eyes and a pale face obscured by strands of snow-white hair.

It's only a _moyashi_, Kanda thinks, and stares, and can't quite work up the energy to growl a 'who the _hell_ are you?'.

"Sorry, didn't mean to wake you," the boy murmurs, teeth pulling at his lip. There is a hint of nervousness in the eyes with which he regards Kanda, but he can't for the life of him figure out why; Kanda has neither threatened death nor glared yet. And who _is_— Oh.

Kanda's eyes widen, and he subconsciously tries to pull away from his little slut from the night before, abruptly remembering exactly where and with who he is. He bites back a moan, however, as his body refuses to move and only screams in unbelievable aching pain. He's only been _this_ sore that time after intense training with weights for three days, and he'd told himself that was the last time he did something that incriminating to his necessary daily readiness.

Allen chuckles slightly and reaches out to touch Kanda's face gently. His fingers hesitate a millisecond before doing so, and Kanda frowns inwardly, his face too engrossed in the sensation of the warm fingertips caressing his cheek to reflect it.

"Go back to sleep," Allen suggests with a smirk deftly hidden as a smile.

"Don't tell me what to do, _moyashi_," he growls, pretending that isn't exactly what he plans on doing as soon as he manages to silently and awkwardly —Oh, how it _hurt_— roll over to turn his back on the kid. He lets out a shaky breath and tries to forget what, exactly, they did to get him in this particularly painful state. The next moan he bites back is completely unrelated to his body's soreness.

o0o0o

"Oi, Yuu!"

Kanda is involuntarily pulled from contented semi-consciousness by a voice he has no trouble recognizing, and attempts to tell it to fuck off in no uncertain terms, but it only comes out as a scratchy, indecipherable sound.

"Ooh, he musta done ya _good_," Lavi laughs, and the bed sinks with his weight. Kanda processes this for a moment, and realizes that it must mean only one thing—Allen Walker has left them room.

Not surprising— Kanda is nothing more than a client, there is no need for the boy to stay any longer once the deed is done, and he probably has more people to attend to… and of course, Kanda didn't actually _want_ him to stay, or anything. What would he have said, anyway—good job? You left me so sore I'm completely immobile?

A pair of dry lips presses tenderly against his forehead, and were Kanda in a more alive state, he would have rolled his eyes at Lavi's insistence on displays of affection. Completely unnecessary, Kanda thinks, and completely inappropriate for him. There is nothing neutral about affection; Lavi knows that.

"You gonna at least open your eyes?"

"Fuck… off…" Kanda scrapes out.

Lavi makes a little noise, and Kanda can just imagine him pouting and scratching the side of his nose, "Man, I thought getting laid would relax you a bit, but you've just got something permanently stuck up your ass. Did it not get in the way last night?"

Kanda ignores his body completely for a moment, and shoots out toward Lavi's general direction to clench what seems to be—ah, good, his throat.

"Hey, hey, I was just kidding!" he croaks, his neck warm and pliable between Kanda's fingers, "Yuu… let go…"

He does after due consideration— mainly how long he feels like ignoring the fact that his arm is practically on fire and won't lift another centimeter higher. His hand falls back to the bed like it's made of lead, Lavi coughs a little, and Kanda can only grimace.

"Where's… Mugen?"

Lavi pats his shoulder cheerfully –_ouch,_ Kanda thinks— and then something smooth touches his fingertips. Kanda immediately wraps his fingers around the comforting hilt of his sword, and hears Lavi whistle.

"Surprised you let go of that thing at all. I could almost imagine Mugen sitting beside ya as you and the kid had your nice little round of bunny –hopping mad s—"

"Shut _up_," Kanda snarls, and wonders, for the millionth time in his life, how he got stuck with such a polar opposite for a partner, "Do we—"

"Have any work today? As a matter of fact, I did get a lead, but the boat doesn't leave for France for another week. There's some small fry we can deal with, if you'd like."

Kanda only nods, eyes still closed, and Lavi frowns but takes the opportunity to study him closer. The covers are haphazardly bunched around him, so that his chest is almost completely exposed, as well as one calf. He doesn't think Kanda heard his snickers upon entering the room and seeing all the marks on his skin—plenty of love bites, scratches, and the occasional bruise caused by who-knew-what. Yup, he feels pretty proud of himself for finally getting Kanda laid—not that they haven't done it before, but those times are few and far between, and it's a difficult thing to convince Kanda to step out of his comfort zone. Yuu-chan is a man of stern routine, after all.

He looks absolutely exhausted, and Lavi doesn't blame him. Oh, the horror stories he's heard of that Allen Walker. Miranda tells him he's a nice kid, but rather… rough and demanding. Not unlike Yuu-chan, in fact, which is why the whole thing amuses him so much. Then there's also the fact that they've been working especially hard for the past couple weeks, and though this 'excursion' is anything but restful, Lavi thinks it's good for Kanda.

"You know, they have a policy on how late clients can stay in. You have an hour to get out of here," Lavi says with a smirk, and leans forward as he eagerly awaits the coming internal crisis.

Kanda groans a little and squeezes his eyes shut even tighter, as if maybe that'll make Lavi disappear, or at least shut up, but finally barks, "What time is it?"

Lavi's ecstatic to give the dreaded news with as much cheer as humanly possible, and inhales for suspense, "E-le-ven o'clock!"

Kanda's eyes snap open, and the horror in them is all too evident. Lavi cackles. In all the time he has known him, the latest Kanda has ever woken up is nine, and that is only after a long night of hunting and investigating through the city. Usually, he's a sharp dawn-riser.

Kanda curses loudly and vehemently, and Lavi only manages to catch a few of the unutterable words—Japanese has never been his forte. He backs away as Kanda regales him with one of his foulest early-morning glares.

"Leave the room, then," he says icily, "and wait downstairs."

He doubles the force of his glare when Lavi smirks and pats his leg, and Kanda swears he did that on purpose knowing it would hurt. He sighs once Lavi is gone and counts to three before attempting to sit up fully.

It _hurts_ like _hell, _and he gasps painfully. There is not an inch that doesn't burn, and all his ligaments are stiff. He feels like an old wooden doll, and fights back the nausea that momentarily overcomes him when he attempts to move his legs off the side of the bed. His whole lower abdomen is sensitive to the merest twitch, and his hips refuse to move in their normal radius.

_Oh, that moyashi better be in as much pain as I am_, Kanda thinks viciously as he begins the slow process of dressing. He feels like an inchworm, each movement extra slow and extra painful, and only discipline and pride keep him from screwing it all to hell and lying back down.

Lavi will never let him live this down, he realizes.

o0o0o0o

He was right. The first thing Lavi does upon Kanda's exit from their bedroom after a reluctant but unavoidable three-hour nap, is point and say—

"You're waddling like a duck!"

Kanda immediately straightens out, regardless of how much pain that causes him, and scowls with all his might, "I am _not_."

Lavi merely hums and rests his chin on his palms, munching on an apple. He smirks smugly and says, "So, was it good?"

Kanda nearly doesn't bother, but gives in, lest Lavi mistake the silence, with an answer, "No."

"You're lying!" Lavi points and accusing finger at Kanda's slow-moving figure, "You wouldn't have stood through all that if it hadn't been good. C'mon," he whines, "Spill, how was it?"

"Tch," Kanda says, and takes Lavi's apple. The redhead reaches for it, but is too lazy to actually get off the chair and reach further.

"Unfair, that's my snack," Lavi pouts.

"Exactly," Kanda bites the apple pointedly, "This is your snack, but it's my dinner. Dinner takes priority over a snack."

Lavi accepts Kanda's half-baked logic, if only because it means Kanda will eat something. He'll try to shove something else down his throat before they go to sleep—pasta, Kanda likes pasta. Lavi will never understand how Kanda's body functions with the little food and sleep he gets. And as his partner, it's his duty to look after him. He inwardly snickers as he watches Kanda lean gingerly against the counter, brushing imaginary dust from his black pants and white tank top in an attempt to look somewhat less disheveled. His long hair, which Lavi has always admired, is down, as he prefers, because it gives Kanda a less stern appearance. The ruler-straight ends are tangled and tousled, and Lavi thinks he looks absolutely delicious, with sleepy eyes and swollen mouth, and all the angry red marks lining his arms and the visible parts of his stomach and chest. And the morning-after soreness? Damn near hysterical, and, aside from the waddle, Kanda is just as graceful when languid as he is when fighting. _Che, wasn't good my ass_, Lavi thinks.

He's watching Kanda eat his apple, the white of his wrist contrasting with the rich wine red of the fruit, thinking that there's something missing, and it's not until he twirls his necklace around his index finger as he flips through one of his books on the table that he realizes it.

"Hey, Yuu," he calls, and Kanda offers him a drowsy side-glance and nothing more, "Where's your bracelet?"

The effect is instantaneous. Kanda's arm shoots up, apple thumping on the ground, and his face drains of all color at the sight of his bare wrist. He looks like he's about to be sick, and sways in his spot, eyes never leaving his wrist, as if maybe his incredulity will call back the precious item in question. His coal-dark eyes are wide and distant.

"Hey, hey," Lavi says softly, "Calm down, Yuu, don't freeze up. You think you dropped it somewhere?"

Kanda swallows thickly and croaks out with a hoarse voice, "Last night…"

"Ah," Lavi smiles widely, trying to catch Kanda's eyes to reassure him, "If so, they'll have found it when they were cleaning the room and hold it for you. It's no problem then, if it's there."

Kanda is gripping the counter in a tight-knuckled grasp, eyes still wide and pulse too quick, Lavi notices with a frown. He seems to have barely heard him. Abruptly, he pushes off and makes toward his bedroom, body likely complaining against the quick motions, because he stumbles and nearly falls. Lavi is up in an instant.

"Woah, there, Yuu," he calls as he catches Kanda's balance by holding his shoulders. He hisses when Kanda thrashes vainly against him and elbows his stomach.

"I have to go!" he mutters, and his voice has a thread of hysteria in it, panting slightly as his continued efforts remain futile, with Lavi's arms wrapped firmly around him. His body is tense under Lavi's hands, his pulse fluttering madly with a combination of distress and exertion. Lavi knows how important his sister's bracelet is to Kanda, but it's still unnerving to see Kanda so stressed out.

"Not like this you don't," Lavi says in his sternest tone, "You wouldn't even make it there at the rate you're going," or, he would, by sheer determination and complete disregard to the effects to his body, "You need to sleep, alright, Yuu? The whole point of going to the Katenshi last night was to get you to relax, and now you need to _rest_."

"I will not! Let me _go,_ Arbiter!"

Lavi sighed, "You leave me no choice. You'll thank me when you wake up, Yuu."

"What the hell are— are…" his complaint fades into a low moan as he slumps against Lavi's chest, and Lavi lets go of the pressure points on the pale neck to slide his arms under Kanda's armpits and drag him off toward their room.

He settles Kanda back in bed, tucks the covers around him, fusses over his hair and gives him an affectionate peck on the cheek. The tense lines on his face remain, and it's uneasy sleep for now, but hopefully he'll fall into more peaceful slumber, for at least a couple of hours.

Once he's sure Kanda will remain asleep, he tiptoes out of the room and closes the door behind him carefully. He goes to the phone on the wall, and turns the dial wheel, waiting for the call to go through.

"Hello? Oh, hey, Ray… Do you think you could check on something for me?"

* * *

**Show me the love... you know you want to... **

**  
**


	4. Typhoon

**Kanda totally got away from me this time. He just has a mind of his own. I apologize for the long wait-- enjoy. For Yenaii 3 Thanks for all the help figuring this out.  
**

* * *

**_No Backing Out Once Inside - 4_**

* * *

He lets the warm water soak into his skin and wills away the reminiscent soreness in his lower abdomen and between his legs. It brings back memories of his first years here, where it was rough and painful and near unbearable to his small, childish body. He remembers the blood, the physical pain, the odd dirtiness he's now gotten used to of feeling like a play thing.

He sighs and sinks deeper in the tub until the water tickles his upper lip, and he stares forlornly at the wall. He can't get rid of the image of that pale face with the dark, silken hair surrounding it like a halo of the night, of the thin, lean body working ceaselessly and so gracefully it was like dance, slow and tantalizing at some points, furious and urgent at others. What haunts him the most, however, are the bold curves of the clandestine symbol on his chest, and the onyx eyes that stared like ice, but by the end of the night gleamed as if being thawed.

Usually, he dismisses all memories of his clients to a little boxed up corner in his mind that remains off limits at all times. It's the way he wants, _needs_, it to be. And he's gotten enviously good at it.

He supposes there are exceptions to every rule, but he's not sure whether he's annoyed or pleased at the breach. Certainly frustrated, because he slides his fingertips together and remembers the smoothness of the cascade of dark hair, touches the bruise on his neck and remembers the hot tongue prodding his skin as the lips sucked in a relishing tattoo. He closes his eyes, exhales so as to make bubbles in the water, and lets his imagination replay the scenes as wildly as it wants to. And he's always been known to be _creative_.

He's startled by a knock on the bathroom door, and the image of Kanda lying sprawled among the tousled covers, eyes hazy and half-lidded, gleaming wetly with perspiration, moaning gutturally… Allen shakes himself and calls out, "Come in!"

"Allen?" a round, pretty face with long pigtails hanging on either side peeks in, "I thought you would have taken a bath already."

Allen shrugs and neatly sidesteps telling her than he'd had to take a nap first by peering up at Lenalee, "And you? You sure Komui won't chase you down for peeking at a man other than for work?"

Lenalee snorts, "Please, you're not a man yet," she taunts.

"Am too," Allen mutters, and runs a hand through his wet hair, "So, what do you need?"

"I was wondering if this was yours," she says, and Allen blinks at the object she holds up— a small, white, beaded bracelet.

"That's not mine," he says thoughtfully, "It's…" he scourges his brain for the name he'd been given—he doesn't usually bother attaching names, they are all just faces that disappear in the morning, after all, "…I forgot his name."

Lenalee nods, "Lavi's friend, right? Was he any good?"

Allen, to his great chagrin, feels his cheeks heat up and curses softly, "Gimme that thing."

Lenalee tilts her head to the side, leaning against the doorway, "I can give it to Ray, don't worry," she pauses and grins when Allen makes a face, "Or are you going to _keep_ it? It was so good you want a memento?"

"No way! I— I just want to see it… He didn't seem like the kinda guy who'd have something like this, you know?" Allen says as casually as he can, eyeing the bracelet, "I'll hold it for him, that's all."

Lenalee raises a graceful eyebrow and hums a little tune that speaks of dubiousness, "Ray would look after it, if you're worried about guaranteeing he gets it back."

"I know that," Allen snaps, trying to control that damn blush reflex that pops up every once in a while. He tries to excuse his action in some other way, but can't find any reason why he would have to keep a client's belongings—all lost items are handed over to Ray immediately, so that the client can retrieve them at any time, regardless of whether his escort is currently busy or not.

Lenalee is merciful and accepts his silence with a Cheshire cat grin as she holds the bracelet out. But when Allen reaches for it and grimaces as he stretches a particularly sore spot, Lenalee´s gaze turns incredulous.

"Allen, are you _sore_?" she asks. Allen immediately sinks back down in the lukewarm water and scowls.

"Only a little," he tries to amend embarrassedly, letting the beaded bracelet slide delicately on his arm. He watches it glide up and down with the motions of his wrist.

Lenalee laughs in disbelief, gazing at Allen with a wide-eyed, amused look, "So then, either you must have worked extra hard to show him who he's messing with, or he worked _you_ extra hard."

"The first one," he says immediately, not caring that it had been a little of both, in fact.

"Good, good," Lenalee laughs, patting him on the arm, "You have a reputation to uphold, after all," she looks down at her hand, where the faintest smudge of snow-colored cream dirties her finger, "The make-up's rubbing off, do you want me to get you more concealer?"

Allen peers at his left arm, running his fingers down the length of it and feeling the roughness underneath. He can see the barest hint of deep red darkening the skin in some spots, and nods, "Yeah, thanks."

"I'll get it tomorrow then, when I go with Jerry to get the groceries," she says, bending down to open the bathroom cabinet and rummage through it, "Meanwhile," she takes out a white container and places it on the counter, "you can use this to fix those bits that are starting to show."

Allen nods, absently rubbing his arm, and watches her clean up the sink and vanity, rearranging all his hair clips and lotions on the wooden countertop. His eyes begin drooping, and before he knows it, he's leaning his head back on the edge of the tub, eyes closing.

"So, what was he like?" the meander toward unconsciousness is broken by her soft voice, but Allen doesn't bother opening his eyes. They feel sticky, and he feels languid, lulled by the warm water into a stupor, "For you to have taken an interest in him, he must have been good. And he's Lavi's friend," she adds, as if that means something. Which, if Miranda's words are true, could.

"He was an asshole," Allen murmurs, yawning slightly. He wiggles his toes in an attempt to wake up a little, but he doesn't wiggle very hard because he doesn't actually want to stay awake, "But yes," he admits after a moment, "he was good. He knew what he was doing," he smirks lazily then, the darkness in front of his eyes the perfect backdrop to recall the shying away of those onyx eyes, the pulsing of his heart underneath Allen's hands, the violence with which he snaked his hands along Allen's body, "But, that was definitely the first time he'd come to a house."

"Really?"

"Mhmm."

He hears her sigh in good-humored frustration and set something down, "How can you tell? Komui said the same thing about one of his clients the other day. I can't do that yet."

Allen yawns again, pressing himself against the porcelain walls of the tub to lean his head more comfortably against the edge, "When you've had a lot of experience," he begins, pressing a finger against the inside of his thigh to test the gentle spread of pain. He yawns once more and continues mumbling, "you can tell. They don't look you straight in the eye. They know what they're doing, but they're loath to touch intimately. They don't touch your neck or your face much; they're usually violent and just in for a quick fuck. They don't say much, either, at least _to_ you…" he pauses and adds quietly, "They feel dirty; I can see it. It's another stain added."

Lenalee says nothing, and as Allen takes her silence for awkwardness, it surprises him when instead he feels her hand comb through his wet hair.

"'M not a dog…" he murmurs when she scratches slightly behind his ear, but sighs and leans into the touch anyway. He yawns again and says, "Wake me up 'fore dinner. 'M gonna crash till then…"

o0o0o0o0o0o

Lavi misses the waddle.

He's meekly following Kanda's rampage through the city, the Japanese man being much too restless and impatient to suffer the wait of a carriage. The stressed tap of his heels match the menacing swing of his Mugen, pinned as a permanent fixture to his hip.

The meekness is because, quite logically, as soon as Kanda woke up and remembered what Lavi had done to him earlier, he burst out of the room with a bloody vendetta against him. He came frighteningly close to beheading Lavi at one point in the struggle, but Lavi's too smart (and much too regrettably experienced) to not have foreseen the situation. A metal candleholder and several pleas later left him with just a scratch, which Lavi rubs absently as he watches Kanda's hips tilt up and down like a see-saw. Three hours may have cured him—Lavi has always been jealous of the inhuman healing ability of his partner— but if Lavi looks closely enough, and Ra knows he does, he can tell the difference from the rhythm of his usual gait, how the movement in them is constrained— the see-saw doesn't go up quite enough. In other words, Kanda's just sucking it up. It still hurts.

Lavi has _got_ to remember to congratulate that Allen Walker when he finally meets him.

Kanda marches up to the reception desk without any preamble, eyes focusing squarely on the receptionist, who raises an eyebrow at his brusque manner.

"You," he snarls, forgoing any petty formalities and the wasting of seconds, "You have my item?"

Ray smooths out imaginary papers on his desk, nodding once to Lavi at the readhead's jaunty wave, "Your bracelet, Master Kanda?"

Kanda seethes and grinds out, as if the word is poisonous, "_Yes_."

Ray bows and motions to the stairway, "Allen graciously kept it for you," he rings a tiny silver bell that Kanda had not noticed before, and a maid scuttles from behind the panel at Ray's back. Kanda's blood boils with impatience and disdain at her slow, polite footsteps, "Lyria, please lead Master Kanda to Allen's room."

The maid bows deeply, and Kanda rolls his eyes and stalks toward the stairs without even acknowledging her, letting the shocked maid trot after him uncertainly.

Lavi leans against the counter and listens to Yuu's tramping footsteps up the stairs. He glances at Ray, "Hey, aren't you the one who normally holds lost stuff?"

Ray smiles slyly, "I am."

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

The maid is an incompetent fool of a girl who can barely keep up with him and leads him down twisted passages and a door that he assumes is the division between the filthy sluts' bedrooms and the 'working' area. These inner hallways are significantly less decorated, though Kanda doesn't have much time to really reflect on it. It's not _dirty_, per se, but it certainly is nowhere near as luxurious and welcoming as the clients' quarters and reeks of decrepit age. Not surprising.

"There…" the maid timidly points at one of the scratched-up doors in the gloomy hallway, and Kanda doesn't even bother with a response.

He grabs the doorknob and flings the flimsy door open.

The first thing he notices is the shrill, repetitive ring of a bell, which he quickly spots above the doorway. He recognizes it as the bell that he was told to ring were he to be displeased at any point during his stay. He assumes they use it as a sort of communications, then. He sneers at it and the reception man at the other end, trying to warn his worker of the coming storm— no, _typhoon_ is a more appropriate term, cold, swift and unrelenting.

The room is small and ragged-looking, though Kanda cannot discern much for the dimness of it. There is a tattered blind drawn over the window, but it doesn't provide much cover from the waning sunlight and instead casts odd shadows. He notices all sorts of strange carnival-like paraphernalia placed on shelves around the room, contorted by the mischief of light and shadow. A painted mask leers at him with an exaggerated, lopsided smile and a jester's hat glitters on a hook. Wide eyes glow at him from within the shadows, and his anger ebbs and dwindles under the eerie atmosphere of horror carnival.

"Lenalee…?"

Kanda's eyes are flick immediately over to the figure scrunched up in the bed at the corner of the room. The boy has his face turned away, blankets messily tangled around him so that they cover only a portion of his slim body. There is a delicious slice of tender white thigh peeking out, and Kanda recognizes with a blush the fingernail marks on the nape of his neck, and glances at the fingers on his hand responsible for them.

The bell ceases abruptly, and Allen makes a throaty little waking-up sound that is all too reminiscent of the night before, and Kanda has to swallow to keep his focus from wandering. His sculpted muscles shift fluidly as he struggles to raise himself on his elbows.

"S'it dinner time 'ready?" he yawns.

He pulls his legs gingerly in front of him to sit back, eyes fluttering as if refusing to open without a struggle, and rubs at his lower abdomen with moans of sleepy complaint. He sits cross-legged, facing the head of the bed as opposed to the foot, and blinks a couple times at the headboard, where his name has been roughly carved in handwriting that looks like a grade-schooler's.

Allen then raises his hand, scratching at his head as he gives in to a jaw-splitting yawn.

The brooding light from outside reflects of the pearly beads of the bracelet.

"_You_," Kanda growls, breaking out of his momentary spell of mute observation with a new bout of fury, "What the hell are you doing with that?"

Allen jerks in surprise, whirling around just in time to see Kanda lunge for him. His silver eyes widen in terror like the full moon, though Kanda doesn't understand why, since they are neither focused on him, nor on the hand that reaches for his neck, poised instead on a spot above Kanda's head.

That quickly changes as Kanda rams him against the wall, hand crushing Allen's neck against the wood, and the boy cries out and thrashes vainly. He wraps his small, still-childish fingers around Kanda's steely grip and claws at it desperately as Kanda grinds his palm further into vocal cords which pulse with contractions and send out spastic cries from the boy's gaping mouth.

"What…" he warbles, his voice like a kaleidoscope, broken and fragmented, as he thrashes and tries to kick the dark-haired man away, but Kanda has him firmly pinned against the wall, his legs spread out underneath Kanda's larger body, "Let… go…"

Kanda doesn't respond, watching coldly as seconds pass and Allen's face begins to pale, his lips favoring a gray tinge to their previous rosy pink. He pries off one of the small hands, whose strength has considerably lessened, and holds it high, bending it backward so that the useless lashing of it ceases abruptly. He tugs at the bracelet with his index finger, maneuvers it so that he is able to pull it off Allen's hand without removing his hold, all in quick, silent movements. The little fingers twitch convulsively, and there are little gasp-breaths that Kanda can feel straining the windpipe underneath Kanda's other hand.

_How_ dare _he?—_The thought clatters coldly inside the torrent of ice that forms the center of Kanda's mind.

He never once tears his onyx gaze away from the silver eyes drowning in a bog of panic and bubbling with hatred. The hatred only feeds Kanda's deadly rage, a typhoon of freezing, unrelenting rain.

"You stole this from me?" Kanda whispers venomously in his little _moyashi_'s ear. Their chests are pressed together, and Kanda can feel the trembling bursts of the lungs beneath his. He can barely stand the disgust he feels for this filthy creature mewling and beaten like a stray animal, can barely hold back the wrath he feels at having been—_violated_, he feels like the child has violated him by stealing something so precious to him, and wants to know: "Why?"

And Allen foolishly replies, logic strangled by panic and pride, and dares to pull his blue-tinged lips into a haughty smirk, "To see you… again…"

Kanda's eyes flash, and his hand mirrors the motion by contracting; he feels the strain, feels the familiar bulge of the carotid artery muscling its way under Kanda's palm. The blood lust that attacks him is this hot pool that spreads from his chest, aching where his tattoo lies ingrained in his skin, and clashes with the frozen torrent of righteous anger previously swirling inside. _One more_, it tells him, his sight blurring with the intensity of this searing swell inside him. _Is this a dark soul to add to the count?_

Something pops against Kanda's palm, and Allen's pupils dilate to form unseeing disks of silver—his body suddenly convulses, a hacked cough exploding from his lungs and spraying blood onto Kanda's face.

He lets go immediately; Allen's slack body crumbles against him. It continues to tremble, tremble and writhe in pain, and Kanda listens in mute shock to the wet bubbling of the boy's ragged breaths, his anger and that insidious thirst for blood quenched and being replaced by a sick tightening of his stomach. The flecks of blood on his face are warm, and he finds, with a start, that same warmth dripping on his hand underneath Allen's face.

"O-Oi, you…" Kanda says, eyes wide upon Allen's bare back, heaving and shaking as waves of sticky warmth slide slick over his hand with each of the boy's strangled coughs. He tries again: "You… _moyashi_…" and Allen whimpers mid-aborted-breath. Kanda falters.

_What have I done?_ he wonders dazedly, breathing in the familiar alkaline tang of blood. The snow white of the boy's hair is stained by red, and it somehow makes Kanda feel ashamed in a way he hasn't for many years now, for having let the lust for blood take control of him. He sits there for a moment, torn between indifference—the damn bastard whore _deserved_ it, after all, for stealing his belongings— and the foreign churning inside his stomach. His hands twitch as if wanting to do something, opening and closing with a child's indecision, but they don't _know_ how to cradle and hold, so they lay uselessly on Allen's body.

He wants to leave, but something is holding him back—this shame, this regret, this feeling of filth as he watches the pristine white skin smudged by crimson, sees that crimson fall drop by drop on the white covers and spread into the fabric, never to be removed again. One of the boy's hands is fisted on his shirt, fingernails pinching Kanda's skin, the other wrapped protectively around his throat. The strangled whimpers are still there, making a shiver run down Kanda's spine. The room is dark, and the bed creaks slightly with Allen's fitful thrashing.

Kanda simply does not know what to do.

Allen solves the problem for him.

With a mighty shudder that runs rampant through his frame, the boy pushes himself on his knees, still gasping and choking through that wet seal of blood, and slaps away Kanda's arms in an unmistakable refusal of that hint of humanity tempted to poke through.

"Go… away…" he mutters through gritted teeth, his voice distended and hoarse like a wrung and torn piece of cloth. And Kanda takes the opportunity to extract himself from this discomfiting situation, damning his reluctance and that foreboding wish to look back at the figure tilted dangerously on the bed.

* * *

**I totally did not mean for Kanda to nearly kill Allen. Comments would be appreciated-- I felt that last scene was confusing and convoluted. Any sentences that confused/annoyed you, please point out. As you can see, there is more to come. Retribution and Kanda-humiliation. **


	5. Arbiter

**Appreciate the wait: Enjoy! **

* * *

**_No Backing Out Once Inside: _**_Chapter 5—_

* * *

He closes the door behind him and stands at its back, closing his eyes and timing his breaths with whip-lash precision until his hands unclench, his mouth settles into a fully neutral expression, and he doesn't bat an eye when he hears a muffled cough from inside. 

_Damn slut deserved it,_ he thinks, a tad too viciously, so he inhales again and notes with pride that the knot in his stomach has loosened and there is nothing inside but chilly indifference with a swath of righteous irritation. This is the way it _should_ be, and damn that brat for disrupting his calm and _daring_ to steal his sister's bracelet on a pretense as ridiculous as seeing Kanda again. As if Kanda would ever come back. Che.

The maid, whatever-her-name-might-be, is gone, for which Kanda is simultaneously grateful and exasperated. She was a twit, certainly, but a twit who knew her way around here, unlike Kanda. He now has to divine a way back down to the lobby, and there had not seemed to be as many scattering passages branching off when they had first come through.

He makes a turn down a gloomy hallway that he thinks—hopes— feels familiar, and almost runs into an oddly shaped thing which jumps back almost as quickly as he does.

"Oh, I'm sorry—wait, you're a customer! You're not supposed to be here!"

Kanda blinks as the haphazard lump turns out to be a round-faced girl hefting a large basket of laundry in her arms. He notes she is Asian, a rarity here in London, but surmises she appears to be Chinese. Her dark eyes peer at him in mild reprisal.

"I'm trying to find the exit," he says as politely as he can, though the hand rubbing his temple belies it. The girl's eyes alight on his wrist and comprehension dawns on her face.

"Oh,_you're_ Lavi's friend. I'm glad you got your bracelet back," the girl smiles cheerfully, "You're lucky to have gotten it back at all—I was about to throw away the sheets when I noticed that caught on the tassels," she grins knowingly at her next words, "When I showed it to Allen he said it was yours, and that _he'd_ hold it for you until you came to pick it up," she seems particularly amused by that, giving Kanda an appraising gaze that runs his from head all the way down to his boots.

Kanda feels his mouth go dry and his stomach clam up abruptly, "You found it…? The boy didn't… take it from me?"

"Take? Allen?" she seems scandalized by the thought, "Goodness, no! Allen would never do something like that! I found it all tangled in the tassels," she shifts to support the basket with her hip, "It probably got caught there last night when you two were, you know, doing your stuff," she pauses, and peers at him, "Are you alright?"

He doesn't know how to answer, feeling sort of like the lights were turned off and the floor had been taken out from under his feet, but then he hears a raucously loud laugh that he recognizes as Lavi's and it snaps him back into sharp awareness. He makes a curt dismissal and takes off in pursuit of the sound, dashing past darkened hallways.

o0o0o

"So," Lavi begins, raising a slim eyebrow in Kanda's direction. Kanda keeps his gaze firmly locked on the window, pretending the rumbling of the carriage is overpowering Lavi's words. But Lavi, _of course_, isn't deterred by Kanda's obvious 'get-the-hell-away' demeanor—never has, really, "What happened?"

"Nothing happened," Kanda mutters as evenly as he can between gritted teeth.

Lavi tsks him, "Spill, you got your bracelet back, so you _should_ only be in irritated mode—you're at internally pissed, which means you did something wrong and don't want to admit it. When_others_ do something wrong, you get externally pissed."

Kanda's irritation momentarily blanks out as he simply stares at Lavi and his ridiculously on-target _idiocy_. Then it surges with new-found rancor, "I _hate_ you."

"Do not, you love me more than life itself," Lavi grins and makes a heart shape with his hands. Kanda stares at him as if his skin had spontaneously turned a particularly horrifying shade of green. Or pink. Lavi rolls his eyes, "I josh, I josh; you love me like a bottle of your non-existent shampoo."

The carriage rattles to a stop, the horses snorting in the warm, early-autumn air, and Kanda takes the opportunity to jump off without a further word, sweeping up the steps leading to the front door of their quaint little London flat, only to realize that he doesn't have the keys.

"Forgot them when you went out on your rampage, did you?" Lavi says from behind him, twirling the keychain on his finger with a damnable smirk.

_Shit_, Kanda thinks, and makes a swipe for it. Lavi's smirk widens.

"Patience, Yuu, is a virtue," he coos in his ear, almost about to insert the key when someone calls out his name.

"Arbiter!" both Kanda and Lavi turn around to see a short, fat man stomping his way to them, the sidewalk quaking under his furious feet. His apron-covered pot belly jiggles with each stop, as do his droopy jowls. There is a tattered child being mercilessly dragged behind him. Kanda growls, already knowing what is to come, but Lavi sighs imperceptibly and squeezes Kanda's shoulder.

"Just go in," he mutters sullenly, pressing the key into Kanda's palm, "This shouldn't take long."

Lavi descends the steps, and Kanda unlocks the door, but doesn't go in, instead watching the scene with narrowed eyes.

"This runt here," the corpulent man bursts out before he's even reached Lavi, "I caught him stealing food from me!"

Lavi frowns, and takes a look at the disheveled urchin being pulled by a gritty, wheat-thin wrist. The child doesn't struggle, looking up blankly at him as if resigned to this fate.

"What did you catch him stealing?" Lavi finally says, turning to the man, whom he's now placed as the owner of the little market down the street. He's never liked that store.

"Food! Some of our best sausages and bread! This is the third time this week! I would have beat the boy, but that's against the law, so instead I'm going to let _you_ do it," the man bellows, jowls shaking with his self-righteous rage. He throws the kid on the ground between them and stands there, clearly expecting Lavi to do something.

"Sir, we don't administer physical punishments for petty thieving," the child's hair is matted, and his wrists are so thin, clearly visible through torn patches in his dirty, ragged clothing. Lavi could step on them and they'd break.

"The little brat stole quality merchandise from me! He's broken the law! He must pay for it somehow! That's your job, isn't it? To give out punishments?" his mustache bristles with bafflement at Lavi's lack of action.

Lavi runs a hand through his hair and tears his eyes away from the cut on the child's face and the bruise above his eyes, "We administer justice, sir," he wants to add, _what payment can you expect from a child who can't even feed himself?_ but instead continues with, "You say you caught him in the act, which means he didn't actually steal anything. The most we can do in this case is give you recompense for the past transgressions. The food couldn't have been worth more than a couple shillings, right?"

"Erm, yes, that's about right," the man burbles, looking confused as Lavi kneels and raises the child from his prone position on the ground, setting him on his feet. The poor thing is shaking, wariness overpowering the blankness of the eyes with which he regards the redhead. Lavi reaches a hand into a tattered pocket, fishing around for a moment before withdrawing several coins, pressing a quick finger to the child's lips in response to his wide eyes.

"Ah, good," he counts the coins, "Three shillings. This should suffice. It's fair payment for whatever he's stolen before, as you just agreed," Lavi hands the money to the man, and takes the child by the shoulder, squeezing it briefly, "And this kid won't trouble your store any longer, will you?"

The child blinks once, wide-eyed, then vigorously shakes his head.

"This matter is dealt with, then. Good day," Lavi nods at the man in dismissal and stands there with the child until the massive figure ambles away, muttering under his breath after throwing a begrudging look over his shoulder at Lavi. The redhead takes another shilling from his pocket and holds it up for the child's hesitant hands to take, then sends him off.

The streets are such a harsh home, he thinks.

o0o0o

"That's a nice way to spend our hard-earned money," Kanda says once Lavi closes the door, and Lavi bites down a sharp retort at the sarcasm in his partner's voice. He decides that for now, the best route is silence, so he bypasses Kanda's primly seated form in the reading chair and heads to the kitchen to pour himself some water. Kanda just has no compassion for anything, Lavi tells himself. He's the type that drowns kittens remorselessly.

"You're not fulfilling your duties," Kanda informs him when Lavi walks back in and drops down on the couch, sprawling out. Cold water and a bite of his favorite strawberry biscuits were enough to restore most of his Kanda-tolerance. Love the guy, but Kanda can be a complete asshole sometimes—most times— though usually it doesn't bother Lavi too much.

"What are you talking about? I was a perfectly good Arbiter right there. The old man would be proud."

Kanda flips a page of his book, though he does spare a scathing glance, "You're lying and you know it. You have to be impartial."

"I have to be _just,"_Lavi snaps, sitting up angrily, "And yes, sometimes that means I have to be impartial, but that wasn't the case here. I gave the man fair recompense for what had been stolen."

Kanda closes his book with a biting thud and stands, towering over Lavi, "You became emotionally involved. You pitied the boy. The simple facts are these: You let a thief escape without any punishment so he could continue his crimes. You can't sympathize just because you've been in the same position. I repeat: You're not fulfilling your duties."

Kanda's cold voice hangs in the air even after the door to their bedroom has been closed, and Lavi stares at it in complete shock with a million arguments and ironies and retorts clamoring in his brain. He finally settles on the easiest one to yell out as he grabs a cushion from the couch and throws it as hard as he can at the door, though it does nothing more than thump plumply off the door and onto the floor.

"At least mine haven't made me a stone-hearted bastard!"

o0o0o

There is some truth to that, Kanda can concede, when he bothers to compare himself with other people. Right now, however, it is an odd irony. After all, does Lavi think he'll be able to get anywhere in life if he can't fulfill what is required of him? He may grouse and agonize about it, but the bottom line is that what Lavi wants can only be accomplished by succeeding Arbiter. Lavi is next in line, but if Arbiter were to catch a couple performances like this one, that would be put into question. Lavi needs to set his priorities straight. Kanda is simply trying to help.

But speaking of priorities… Kanda has his own mission to fulfill, and it does not involve any white-haired whores. So _why_ can he not stop thinking about that? The odd feeling of remorse still lingers at the back of his throat, irritating like breathing in ashy smoke, or rubbing rusted metal.

He can't have hurt the kid _that_ badly, can he? Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't have cared, but… he _hadn't_ stolen his bracelet, as Kanda had originally thought. Still, Kanda argues against himself, the brat had implied it, so it had been his fault. Kanda's reaction was completely justified.

Wasn't it? The answer mocks and eludes him, hiding among the clinking of the beads of his bracelet, and it drives him mad.

* * *

**No Allen this chapter, but we'll have separation anxiety soon enough. A la Kanda, of course. **


	6. Retribution

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**Sorry for the long wait! I give you a longer chapter as consolation. Special character added for fun :)  
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**Warnings: LOTS of language, shounen-ai, redlight districting, and some gore  
**

**Enjoy! **

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**_No Backing out Once Inside- 6  
_**

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_What the_ hell _am I doing here?_ Kanda berates himself, scowling, glaring, _glowering_ at the deceptively clean and demure looking doors of the brothel across the street. People mill about: carriages cross the street in front of him, blocking his view of the people passing by. In the daylight, all sorts of people walk past the building without a second glance— mothers and their well-dressed children, businessmen with their hats constantly tipped at passing gaggles of girls, newsboys screaming the latest headlines into the asphyxiating smog of the London air. The occasional young man with the rogue beard and carelessly-swinging cane spares a second glance at the sign above the brothel and 'casually' notes the working hours. Kanda sneers and leers at them, but can't do it publicly because he himself is standing just across the street, his eyes flicking between the doors and the direction of their flat just a few streets away. He scrubs at his face and sets his jaw, damning Lavi furiously because it's obviously his fault for getting him in this predicament in the first place.

He will _not_ go in there. Not matter what. He does _not_ care enough about that little slut to go in there and… Besides, he can see how that conversation would go: "Hello, I just wanted to know if I killed your worker yesterday." Kanda snorts in derision, and intensifies his glare. He _will not_ go in there. Unfortunately, that leaves him standing rather uselessly outside, and his feet will not turn and head him back home for some unexplainable reason.

What if Kanda actually killed him? He mentally shakes his head, which physically manifests itself as a narrowing of his eyes—there's no way he hurt him that badly. The kid had enough energy to push him away at the end, stubborn idiot.

That settles it. Kanda will not lower himself enough to enter a brothel to ask about a whore, and he can't believe he let himself actually feel guilty enough to come here in the first place. It's ridiculous, with how many bodies he's left behind bloodied and headless.

He turns to head back, and notices a door open from the brothel into the alley next to it, through which a little boy—Kanda judges him to be no older than ten— steps out, carrying an empty sack. He exchanges words with someone still inside, and leans against the wall to tie his shoes. Before he can think twice about it— Kanda's always been good at following his gut, though he usually does it with more discretion than others—he walks across the street and stands at the entrance of the alley.

"You," he begins, pointing at the kid. He looks up, unfazed, and finishes tying his shoe, "There is—" he remembers the name scrawled across the headboard, "an Allen here?"

The child's face brightens as he straightens up, "Yeah! You want Allen?"

"Yes," Kanda pauses, "Wait, no. I mean— Fuck," he doesn't _want_ Allen in any way, obviously, but he doesn't know how to say what he wants, which is…

"I can get him for you!" the child says, and is about to turn heel and go back in when he stops and pouts, "Oh, wait, I forgot. Allen got sick, so he can't go out of his room."

"Sick?" Kanda tries to keep his voice neutral and uninterested, "How?"

"I dunno. But Lenalee— she's the girl who takes care of us— she's been _really_ mad. She almost yelled at someone today. I heard he couldn't _eat_," the child's eyes are wide, as if that's the most shocking part of it all, which, when Kanda remembers the disgustingly large amount of food the boy had eaten that night, is a reasonable thing to think. He clenches his fists and tries to quell the feeling sloshing in his stomach.

"Ah… I see," he sticks his hands in his pocket and turns around.

"Wait, Mister, what's your name?"

"You don't need to know that," Kanda says curtly.

The child frowns, "But then I can't tell Allen you came to see him."

Kanda yanks the boy by the collar and hisses, "Do that and I'll cut your throat. Got it, kid?"

The child stares at him as if unsure whether to believe him or not, but nods his head mutely anyway and scurries off with his sack when Kanda releases him.

_Shit_, Kanda thinks, _I just went and threatened another civilian…_ Maybe Lavi's not so wrong when he says Kanda needs to get a hold of his temper. Not that Kanda will ever tell him that. Because his temper's _not_ that bad, it's just that stupidity is an unpardonable sin, and a lot of people seem to be guilty of it.

o0o

Three-hundred and twenty-seven. But of those, how many are dark souls?

Kanda wipes his blade carefully on the beige carpet, leaving an artistic swipe of toxic-bright, dangerous color on the neutral brown and beige landscape of the parlor. There are other stains, caused by his blade but not originating from it, lying in different places around the house.

"Yuu! C'mon, I'm gonna need your backup here," Lavi motions to him from the staircase spiraling upwards, and Kanda carefully steps over the saturated carpet mess to stand in front of him and lead the way. He's fairly certain he's taken care of all but those who ran away, but greed spurs heroics, and it's possible that at the boss's fiscal persuasion, one of them might be waiting to ambush them.

"You have the proof yet?"

"No. It must be in his study. Or on his person. If it is, it's all yours. And he's sure to count," Lavi pats Kanda's back cheerfully, and glances below them at the spread of the parlor, "Shards, you really did that guy in. That's a hell of a mess," he wrinkles his nose in distaste, "I told you to keep the stink down and avoid the intestines. We're gonna be here another hour at least trying to find the blackmail papers."

"Hn," Lavi simply doesn't understand that what happens after the body dies is of no concern to Kanda. He supposes he could actually make an effort to avoid the entrails, but opportunities come in a fight, and Kanda takes them. The quicker and deadlier the kill, the better.

They meet no one on the stairs, or in the hallway. They check each room one by one, but all of them are unused, and a cursory sweep-through reveals them empty as well. They keep a sharp lookout behind them, however, in case the ringleader of the operation, an obscure aristocrat, is hiding out and tries to sneak by them. Near the end of the well-light hallway are several other rooms, and they both slow down and quiet their steps at the sound of a paper rustle in one of them. Kanda walks in first, sword up and ready to parry off anything that might come their way. His caution is rewarded when a shot fires and a bullet whizzes over his head.

"Stay there, or it won't be the air I shoot!"

"Good evening, Mr. Tudor," Lavi says smoothly behind him, as if the man standing behind the behemoth desk is not pointing a gun at them, standing shakily on his feet with his face attempting, but not quite succeeding, to look calm. Kanda keeps Lavi safely behind the protection of his held out sword and lets him take over.

"I'm only here on some business," Lavi continues, eyes sweeping over expertly around the room, and Kanda knows his sharp eyesight will find any hidden locks or trapdoors where any secret documents might be found in the cherry-scented room, "For example, the recent arsons of the East End neighborhood—funny, isn't it, that the man who owns the company that's about to sell out the one you have stocks in—he nearly died in the fire. I think it's damn near hysterical, don't you?"

Kanda isn't sure whether he's talking to him or the man, so he grunts softly, eyes on the trembling finger that hovers over the trigger.

"I'm here on the Arbiter's behalf. You have been found guilty of hiring arsonists to get rid of your competition," Lavi draws out several folded sheets of paper from his jacket, "The proof is these papers, found on the arsonists when they were caught, detailing their transactions with you."

"But—But that was written in code!" the man says desperately, not even attempting to deny the charges with the blatant proof being waved in the air, "You couldn't have found anything there!"

Lavi raises a slim eyebrow, "You don't think the Arbiter's heir could break such a simple code?" and he proceeds to read the paper, word by word. Kanda doesn't glance over at it—he's already seen it, and could make nothing of the scribbles and odd punctuation marks. Lavi had taken one glance at it and proceeded to spend the next hour undoing the code. There was a method to these things, he'd told Kanda, and once one knew which one of them they'd used, it was easy decoding it.

Tudor's face is substantially pale, and Kanda feels a smirk growing on his face at the strength of his fear. The man catches sight of it, its monstrousness, and his face takes on a fascinating shade of sickly green. The man's finger twitches.

"Oh, and I wouldn't recommend shooting that gun. My friend here has rather fast reflexes. If you want to risk a ricochet into your brains, go ahead," Lavi shakes his head, "People just don't seem to understand that golden rule: Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. The Arbiter has decided upon your fair punishment: The value, including his injuries and those of his servants, of the damage will be compensated by an immediate burning of all your property save the storage shed, servants' quarters, and the left wing."

Tudor's eyes widen. Kanda tenses, eyes never straying from the trigger and the tip of the gun, aimed now squarely at Lavi's head.

"If I may have some time to remove a couple things—"

"Immediate," Lavi cuts him off, eyes flashing, "No warning, just as the victim."

Tudor's face contorts with rage, and the next few seconds take Kanda by surprise. The trigger finger presses down, and Kanda is ready for that, parries that, but simultaneously, the hand that has been at the man's side, blocked from view by the table edge, comes up. There is another gun in it, and Kanda is unable to react properly to this jack-in-the-box that is shot a split second after the first. There is no time to check on Lavi, though he hears a choked gasp, because four more bullets come after that. Kanda blocks all of them, thankful that the small, palm-sized model limits the chamber size to merely four bullets, and the first gun was already half-way empty.

"You will not burn my home!" Tudor screeches furiously, throwing both guns to the floor and standing there with a heaving chest and splotchy red rising in his cheeks with a faint dash of fear.

"Kanda…" Kanda spares a millisecond-long glance at Lavi behind him to see the man clutching his arm close and leaning against the doorframe, eyes narrowed on their target. There was the bright flash of blood, but nothing looked too out of place, "He's all yours."

Kanda wants to turn around and blink at Lavi in surprise, but the time for questions can come later. He smirks again and slips into his killing pose, stomach clenching in pleasant anticipation. This scum will certainly count, and his sword will appreciate the taste of dark blood.

"Mr. Tudor, you are also found guilty of the rape and murder of young Jesselina Underwood. The punishment for this crime is death."

Kanda bares his teeth at Lavi's words and lunges forward. Flecks of hot blood paint his face. He flicks his tongue out to clean his lips and catches the metallic sparks, savoring them.

o0o

"Does it still hurt to talk?" Lenalee says as she sits at the edge of Allen's bed. Allen glances up from his cards, sitting across from Daisya, and smiles, gathering the covers more comfortably around himself.

"It's not—"

"Silence," Lenalee interrupts, smacking him lightly on the head, "Even if you want to pretend it's not that bad, it hurts _me_ to hear you sound like that," she levels a warning glance at him, the kind that has made fighting bulldogs cower. He pouts at the unfairness, and the corner of her mouth twitches in her attempt to keep the stern face on, "No more talking, alright? Now, let me see how it's doing…"

She lifts the scarf wrapped delicately around Allen's neck and Daisya lets out a low, curving whistle, while Lenalee herself flinches at the sight.

"Damn, I mean, was the fucker tryin' to kill ya?" he mutters, staring wide-eyed and awed at Allen's neck, even leaning forward to get a closer look. Allen opens his mouth to respond, but at Lenalee's Look, closes it again and shrugs instead. The skin is bruised and mangled beyond recognition, with little crescent moons past the side. Allen's voice is terribly hoarse, nearly inaudible, and though the doctor said it wouldn't, probably, cause any permanent damage, he's still slightly groggy and lightheaded and spent the first two days after that feverish and half-conscious, struggling to breathe and swallow with the infernal pain that accompanied—still does, to a lesser extent.

"Are you hungry?" Lenalee asks after a moment, running her fingers idly through his hair to comb out the few knots. Allen thinks about it. He's starving, yes, but the effort and pain required to eat was not worth it the first couple days. At this point though, the hunger overrides any discomfort. He nods, and she brushes his cheek with her spindly, graceful fingers, smiles, and leaves.

"Hit me," Daysia sets his cards between them, and Allen obliges. Daisya is a few years older than Allen, an explosive, unruly whirl of crudeness and flaunting modernism. He fulfills the kinkier, more obscure tastes of their patrons, and does it with flair and a damnable grin on his face. Like Allen, he too worked in a traveling circus, showing off his skills with a joker's bell he tossed and spun between his feet with daredevil stunts and erratic, liquid effort. It was he that convinced Allen, in fact, to get the tattoo on the side of his face, at the same time that Daisya himself got clown-tear-lookalikes under his own eyes. Allen has always felt a bond of camaraderie with him, and they are the closest thing to brothers that Allen would ever allow himself to become with anyone.

"Hey, hey, you know who I'm doin' tonight?" Daisya leans over and grins devilishly, "_That guy­._ The one who makes all the funny noises if you play him right."

"No way!" Daisya has been telling him about this guy for _months_.

"Yes, my good friend. And, because you can't have any clients right now, you can finally listen to it! I told Ray to set me up in the fifth room, that way you can be in the fourth, since Komui's out tonight, and no one likes that lice-infested room besides him."

"Is it loud enough that I'll be able to hear it through the wall?"

Daisya shrugs, "I think so. I'll prod the bastard a little harder just in case, but if you put your ear against the wall it should be fine," he glances down at his cards, and draws one more. They both reveal their hands, and Allen has four of a kind, while Daisya has one pair.

"Aw man, you _always_ win! What whore-poxed luck!" Daisya grumbles, tossing his cards in the air in a fit of frustration and then blowing his cheeks out as he realizes he has to pick them up again.

"Whore-poxed?"

"I heard the sailors using it the other day," Daysia grins. His favorite place to sneak away to is the harbor, and most of his more unusual ideas and tastes come from there. Allen suspects that when Daisya can buy his freedom, he'll enlist in a ship and tour the word, "Stole it from the Portuguese. Bet it sounds cooler in Portuguese, but it's wicked awesome, isn't it?"

"Kinda funny for us to be using it, isn't it?" Allen begins to laugh, then stops because it jars his throat. Daisya narrows his eyes.

"You kicked his piss-cutting ass, right? For doin' that? Lenalee's about to burst a blood-vessel, she's so pissed."

Allen blinks, "She is?" She was outraged at first, sure, but earlier she seemed to be relatively calm, if worried, but certainly not as mad as Daisya is making her out to be.

"Yeah, she's only being nice around you because she doesn't want to upset you or some lice-ridden crap like that."

"Ah," Allen lowers his eyes and deals the cards, purposely avoiding a continuation of the topic. He had tried to explain to Lenalee that it wasn't entirely the man's fault that he'd lost control like that—Allen had baited him. Lenalee hadn't exactly listened to him. Something about overkill.

Allen wonders about the importance of that bracelet, and wishes he had a second chance to ask. But the man will never come back, he's sure.

o0o

"Damn occupational hazards," Lavi breathes, grimacing and leaning against the wall as Kanda sheathes his sword. Lavi hands him the handkerchief he keeps in his jacket so that Kanda can wipe the blood off his face without resorting to sleeves or tongues. Or tongue, because while Lavi might like Kanda in lots of different flavors and varieties, bloodstained isn't one of them.

"What was the evidence that he killed the girl?" Kanda asks at length, once they're picking their way through the littered bodies on the ground, making their way out of the soon-to-be-fought-over mansion. Greedy heirs and all that.

"The ring on his finger," Lavi answers distractedly, feeling woozy from the blood loss and the blood stench. It's safely in his pocket, and he will present it to Arbiter as the proof of their judgment. He stumbles a little, and though Kanda doesn't offer a hand—Lavi rights himself almost immediately— he does watch closely in case the misstep becomes more serious. There is a makeshift bandage around Lavi's arm, but Kanda will clean and inspect the wound thoroughly as soon as they get home "When he raised the second gun I saw it. It's the same ring that was missing from the girl's body that was found. He probably didn't do the actual killing himself, but certainly the rape."

"One of the cronies we killed is sure to have been the one to finish the deed," Kanda says darkly, thumb rubbing the tip of his sword handle while his eyes flash toward his bracelet. Lavi follows the drift.

"Yeah, he'll have counted too. So tonight you have two souls for sure, if not more."

Kanda clears the way of debris and holds the heavy wooden front door open for Lavi to stagger through.

"Three-hundred and twenty-eight. Of those, eighty-three we're sure count," Kanda says, and there is determination intermingled with a deeper undertone of despair, which rings cacophonously with the anger coating his voice like bitter caramel.

_Only nine-hundred and seventeen left, Yuu_.

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** Thanks for all the lovely reviews you guys have given me. I was thoroughly amused by everyone's bashing of Kanda for what he did and sympathizing with Allen. It was mean but... they are the type that would have a terrible misunderstanding like that. Kanda will get his punishment. And, who likes Daisya? :waves hand in the air: I love the bugger. Credit for his language, btw, goes to James Clavell's _Shogun. _  
**


	7. Confrontation

**Sorry for another long hiatus, but I'm finally trying to get this ball moving again. **

**Enjoy this chapter, where I painfully drag out the plot and drop infuriating hints! **

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**_No Backing Out Once Inside - 7 _**

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Kanda skims through the eyewitness accounts, trying to sort out the inconsistencies, but who is he kidding? This is Lavi's forte. Though he's not exactly lacking in the intelligence department, Kanda is most definitely the brawn of this team. And if Lavi can't make sense of this information, Kanda sure as hell doesn't have a chance.

This is the big fish. The one they are hoping to find more about in France. Kanda narrows his eyes as he reads through the words. _Like a demon… just appeared behind me… nothing else was touched, it just vanished… most sinister smile I have ever seen… _

_A strange cross-like mark on the forehead. A scar, I reckon, though it was black. _

Kanda digs the point of his fountain pen below that statement, pursing his lips. That is the only true lead they have. It marks the perpetrator as a member of the Noah clan.

Kanda sighs and shoves his chair back as he stands up, leaving the stacks of papers spread out on the table as he heads through the living room and to their room. He pushes the door open quietly, reminding himself to grease the hinges when they offer a pleading groan. The room is still dark, the shades blocking the traces of morning sunlight filtering through the clouds outside. Kanda steps carefully, remembering from that morning where Lavi's shoes, bag and other miscellaneous items are scattered on the floor, no matter how many times Kanda has barked at him to be neater, and slips his feet into the shoes waiting patiently at the foot of his already-made bed. He reaches for the wallet on the top-right corner of his dresser and tucks it into his pocket and turns around.

He steps over to the lump on the other bed, his eyes accustomed enough to the gloom to make out Lavi's sleeping face, the skin between his eyebrows puckered in discomfort. From this angle, Kanda can see both the bandages covering the gunshot wound and the flexible cloth wrapped as a sling around his shoulder to keep it in place. Kanda places his hand on Lavi's forehead, gauging the temperature with his own, relieved to find it lower than it had been the night before by the time they'd returned home from their assignment. Lavi stirs, pressing his lips together as if trying to speak, fingers lifting weakly as if trying to grasp something.

"Ummî…" Lavi murmurs, face turned toward Kanda, and when Kanda takes his hand back from his forehead, cries again, louder, "Ummî…" and proceeds to babble something in what Kanda recognizes to be Arabic, sounding like a child asking his mother not to leave. Kanda gets the strange feeling that it's exactly what Lavi's doing.

Kanda hesitates, but there is nothing for him to do here, nothing he can do save tuck the covers tighter around Lavi. It's not the first time Lavi's called his mother in his sleep, but it is not usually accompanied by further words, especially in Arabic. All things considered, it is simply a side effect of the fever, Kanda tells himself.

0o0

When Kanda returns, closing the door behind himself with a foot, hefting the sack with today's bread and fruits in his arm and dropping the newspaper on the kitchen table, Lavi immediately makes it known that he's awake and thirsty for attention. Which is not a fact that changes with the time of day, as it is.

"Yuu, where were you?" he hears from the bedroom, and Kanda rolls his eyes and bites back a groan. He drops the grocery bag unceremoniously on the counter, taking out the items one by one and putting them away, not bothering to respond to Lavi's call since Lavi's going to continue talking anyway. 3… 2… 1…

"Yuu, I was all by my lonesome," point one for Kanda, though it's not worth keeping track of, unless Kanda were to get something in return, say, Lavi being quiet for a whole day, "and in pain! That was much too inconsiderate, cruel even! Are you going to come say hello? I need you help!"

Kanda follows the pauseless stream of words to the now bright room, courtesy of drawn blinds and the light bulb, and stands at the doorway, arms crossed and Mugen tilted just short of ideal unsheathing position, subtlety which Kanda knows Lavi can read by this point in their partnership. Lavi is standing in front of his dresser, still clad in his pajamas, and Kanda sees at once what the problem is. The drawer can only be opened by pulling the handles on both sides, and with Lavi one-handed, the drawer remains stuck in a faintly diagonal and completely useless position.

"Ah, there you are," Lavi says happily, "Will you strip me?" Kanda's first reaction is to gape before he realizes that Lavi's pulling his leg. After Lavi's done laughing at his initial expression he sits on the bed, fingers splayed delicately over his injured shoulder, "Much as I would enjoy you doing that, I think I can wiggle out of my sleeping clothes by myself. I do need help opening the drawers and dressing though."

So while Lavi wrestles himself literally single-handedly out of his pants and button-down shirt, Kanda sifts through the drawers. He pays attention to what shirt and pants he's picking, as opposed to just picking at random like he does with his own clothes since Lavi's clothes are less likely to match at random than Kanda's are. The beauty of a monochrome wardrobe, Kanda thinks.

"Here," he says, tossing the clothes next to Lavi's grunting and writhing form. The pants are off, but his head is halfway out of the collar, as he tries to unbutton the last button to allow his head to go free. Kanda considers leaving him like that, maybe even watching for amusement, but Lavi suddenly yelps in pain as he twists his shoulder and Kanda scowls and goes over to flick the last button free and carefully pull the shirt over Lavi's head.

"Aw, I love it when Yuu shows he's a human being," Lavi mumbles, gingerly placing his hand over his shoulder in that human tendency of touching the source of pain in an attempt to soothe it, even when that will do nothing. His grimace quickly turns into a grin when Kanda's scowl darkens and he raises the pants and shirt for Lavi to change into.

"If you want any help with _these_ you better stop spouting damn inanities out of that mouth."

Lavi pouts, but finally shrugs, not really up to it with his shoulder throbbing angrily in demand for attention. He would take painkillers, but unfortunately, those mess with his state of mind as well, and he can't work without being clearheaded, so no pain meds for him. Kanda sits next to him and unwraps the bandages around his shoulder, and Lavi cranes his head to get a better look. The bullet went clean through, which is a good thing because it means there had been no need to remove it, and it lessens the chance of infection. Downside is that it hurts like hell, but he'd complain either way. The wound is still red and swollen, sensitive to any movement, and even lack of. It will most definitely scar, Lavi thinks with annoyance.

"It's not festering, but I'll put some disinfectant on it to make sure. You're still running a fever," Kanda mutters, reaching behind to get the disinfectant and cloths from the drawer. The process is short, but painful, and Lavi babbles about the new case Arbiter's assigned him to settle to distract himself, knowing full well that Kanda is not paying him any heed. He doesn't tell him to shut up either, though.

Quite honestly, Lavi just wants to get back in bed and sleep for a while longer, but he has things to do. Damn occupational hazards, getting in his way. Kanda's the grunt work precisely because _he_ can take damage without a problem. Kanda helps him ease into the shirt and vest, and with buttoning his pants, growling when Lavi just can't resist making a jibe about _that_ particular position.

"Eggs and biscuits for breakfast," Kanda calls out from the kitchen a few minutes later, and Lavi hears the rummaging of pans and utensils when he finishes brushing his teeth.

"Put bacon in mine!" he yells back above the noise of running water, putting up his toothbrush and yanking a washcloth from its hook to wash his face. Kanda normally makes breakfast, since he's always up earlier than Lavi, who's often stayed up late the night before reading cases and files. It's a nice routine they've established—Kanda makes breakfast and then Lavi will make either lunch or dinner, with the other one usually being eaten out or ignored. It also works because adorable as Kanda's domesticity may be, it is only practical and not far-reaching; Kanda doesn't know how to make much more than breakfast foods. Like he said: it's a nice routine.

Lavi wanders into the living room and drops down on the couch in the middle of their sparsely furnished flat, leaning his head back and listening to the crackling of eggshells from the kitchen. Finally, he resigns himself to consciousness, damning the comfiness of their couch, and fishes for paper and pen amongst the mess that is his living room work area. He sees Kanda has been trying to make sense of the files as well, and he chuckles at the mental image of Kanda's surely frustrated face as he did so.

"It's ready," Kanda informs him, poking his head through the doorway some time after the smell of oven-cooked biscuits has been lingering around his nose in hopes of gaining his attention.

"Great," Lavi looks up for a split second before returning his attention to the letter in his hands, "Give me a second to finish this."

Kanda disappears without any scruples, sitting down to begin eating on his own.

"Oh, you brought me the paper. Thanks," Lavi says as he joins him and sits down, picking it up immediately to scan the front page. Normally, he'd eat and read at the same time, one hand holding up the paper, the older holding his fork, but as it is, he would have to lay the paper on the table and put his fork down every time he wants to turn the page or stab the paper with his index finger as he makes a comment that Kanda won't really understand, not being in tune much with politics and news. Lavi's commentary is rather lack-luster this morning, and there is no finger-stabbing.

Kanda is washing his plate when Lavi sighs and puts his fork down, staring down at his half-finished meal, "Just… leave that there in case I get hungry later," he pulls himself out of the chair, "and I have a favor to ask," he adds, before wobbling back into the living room.

Kanda frowns and follows Lavi, watching him sink down on the couch and lie down, covering his face with his good arm. Kanda narrows his eyes at the stack of papers on the table that Lavi has already scanned in the hour he's been awake. Lavi shouldn't really be up and moving about quite yet, though the injury isn't anywhere near life-threatening. But he's running a fever, and between the mission and the uncomfortable night, Lavi hasn't gotten more than a scant few hours of sleep. The idiot really should be resting right now. But Kanda's sure Lavi knows this on a logical level, and Kanda doesn't really know how to voice his concern, so he simply crosses his arms and stands over Lavi, "What's the favor?"

Lavi motions vaguely to the table, not even bothering to open his eyes, "There's two envelopes there. Deliver them, will ya? I was supposed to meet with them today, but I don't really think I'm up to it, and everything I was going to tell them can be done by letter anyway."

Kanda grunts to show his agreement, takes the two envelopes, gathers his things and when he's about to step through the door, hesitates. He looks back at Lavi's limp form on the couch, arm still thrown over his face, and finally mutters, "Don't be stupid."

Lavi chuckles, "Love you too, Yuu. I'll keep my sorry ass in bed all day if that's what you want."

The corner of Kanda's mouth twitches upward, "Like I care," he scoffs as he closes the door and takes out the envelopes from his pocket. The first one says _Arbiter_, and Kanda assumes it's the report of the night before—there's something small and round in the envelope, presumably the ring. The second envelope makes Kanda stop in his tracks.

It says _Miranda Lotto._

0o0

Hell no. _Hell_ no. There's no fucking way he's … Kanda growls in frustration and almost stabs the man who bumps into him, though in these busy streets, that is an expected and trivial occurrence. Luckily, he checks himself before he actually draws Mugen and simply leaves the man one step closer to heart attack. Kanda seems to be doing that to a fair number of people this morning.

He wonders with vicious intent if Lavi did this to him on purpose. He can't believe he has to step foot again in that place. The unbidden thought _I don't want to see him_ flashes through his mind and Kanda frowns further as he realizes that makes it seem like he's trying to run away from that slut and the incident, and if there's one thing Kanda isn't, it's a coward. He will not let something as insignificant as the possibility of running into someone keep him from going anywhere or doing anything. If there's one thing Kanda _is_, it's prideful.

So, for the fourth time that week, Kanda finds himself in front of the Katenshi, gazing up at its subtle Eastern-style tints and tastefully patterned door. He takes a deep breath, clearing his head and replacing fire for frost in his eyes before he steps in, forging his way quickly across the wide lobby.

"Master Kanda," Ray greets him with a slight bow of the head and a warning in his glance, "What a pleasant surprise," by which he really means, Kanda bets, 'I can't believe you're showing your face here again.'

"I'm not here willingly," he says curtly, removing the appropriately labeled envelope from his pocket and placing it between them on the counter, "From Lavi."

Ray takes it and eyes it before sliding it into his pocket, "It will be delivered. May I ask why Master Lavi could not be with us today? We were looking forward to his presence."

From the corner of his eye, he sees a young girl descending the stairs and pays her no heed, "Hazards of the job," Kanda eventually offers, after cutting the 'it's none of your business' that had threatened to spring up.

"Oh? I hope—"

Had Kanda been outside in the streets, or had it not been a young girl, the two seconds it took her to approach him would have been plenty of time for him to realize what was going on and block her. As it is, coming out of nowhere in a place it has no business coming from, even after he realizes what she is about to do, he does not stop it, and the resounding echo of the slap is as harsh as the sting that flares across his cheek.

"Lenalee!" Ray admonishes immediately, his calm demeanor momentarily breaking to show him flabbergasted. Kanda stands there, dumbfounded as well, while his mind supplies that this is the girl that he'd bumped into when he'd come to retrieve his bracelet a few days ago, with the pretty hair and the friendly smile. This time, however, her Chinese features are frozen and tense with rage, her hand likewise frozen in the air in the follow-through of the slap. Instead of lowering her hand however, she proceeds to dig her finger into Kanda's chest and glare at him with an authority and command that he'd thought impossible for someone more than a head shorter than he is. Someone else clambers down the stairs shouting something, and Kanda freezes when he sees an unmistakable shock of white hair, but is distracted again by the girl in front of him as she starts her rant.

"How dare you come here! After what you did to Allen, you monster!" she snarls, shaking with her righteous fury, "All over a bracelet!" she raises her hand, ready to slap him again, but this time he's prepared for it and catches her hand before it lands, gripping it tightly in warning, his eyes reflecting the same counsel. She gasps, and Ray shouts, Allen shouts, but there is no fear in her eyes, if anything, they burn even more, and she wrenches her hand from his grasp. Allen reaches them, grabbing Lenalee's shoulders in an effort to prevent any further attacks. Kanda refuses to look at him.

"Lenalee, you can't—" Allen looks helplessly between Kanda and Lenalee, "It's not really his fault, I—"

"Nothing you could have done gives him the right to hurt you like that," Lenalee cuts him off, standing in front of him, unafraid and unrelenting, as if blocking him from everything she holds precious behind her. Kanda doesn't know what to do about her, bewildered by her lack of response to his usually effective glare, "You better leave and never show your face around here again," she says with a tone icy enough to match Kanda's on even a bad day.

"I never planned to," he snaps, turning on his heel, ignoring Allen's calling of his name and nearly slamming the door behind him. He's halfway down the stairs when he hears Allen's voice again, but he crosses the street and lets the bustle of the city swallow up the sound.

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**Thank you for reading, and I love your reviews, guys! I'm glad you enjoyed Daysia last chapter, and we'll eventually get to an explanation of Kanda's soul business, and what Lavi and Kanda's respective goals/pasts are. And Allen, let's not forget Allen. **


	8. Separation

**ETA: Sorry about the extra chapter mess-up! It was late and I don't know how I clicked on 'add new chapter' instead of 'replace' even though oen has a drop-down menu and everything -_-;; I blame it on lack of sleep. **

**Finally the next chapter, right? Thank you guys for your patience and your reviews. This chapter is a tad shorter so I could actually get something to you while I work on what the next scenes are.**

**Enjoy!  
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_**No Backing Out Once Inside - 8   
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By the time Kanda reaches the Arbiter's office, an immense courtroom-style building nestled in the less-traveled, but still well-to-do business areas of London, Kanda's indignation and general disorientation has turned to wariness. He eyes the imposing, ornate doors, feeling the first hint of trepidation at the fact that this is the first time he has visited without Lavi.

He pushes open the door, surprised at its easy yield under his hand, and walks in. The front hall is wide and spacious, most likely to inspire awe or intimidation in its visitors, and the floor is made of swirled marble. Likewise, marble columns line the hallway all the way to very end, where there is another set of doors mirroring the outside ones. Kanda knows from personal experience what lies beyond that second set of doors. A courtroom with no seats for a jury, because the one who decides the verdict is the judge, the Arbiter himself.

"May I help you?"

Kanda glances at the receptionist and she meets his eyes with her own calculating look. This is not a place where Kanda's usual intimidation tactics will work, so he doesn't even try, "I'm here to see the Arbiter."

The woman gives him a once-over with cold eyes, "On what grounds?"

Kanda barely keeps the scowl from him face. This is the way they do business in the Arbiter's world. Kanda recognizes the receptionist—he's been here often enough to do so, and he knows that she recognizes him as well. Anyone working for the Arbiter must have impeccable observational skills, as well as the sharp mind to analyze them. But they also have to be completely impartial, a quality which, while admirable and necessary in their line of work, Kanda sometimes finds repulsive. They see other humans as nothing more than records on paper.

"On behalf of Arbiter Junior."

The woman smiles with just a hint of canines peeking through meaninglessly stretched lips, "I trust you know the way."

0o0

Kanda knocks on Arbiter's door, waiting until he hears a gruff 'enter' from inside and then does so, waiting for acknowledgement before moving forward.

Arbiter is a diminutive man, weathered and aged like wine, in a way that has not deteriorated but rather _enhanced_ him, sharpened his tongue and polished his cunning. His face sneers at nonsense with the set of his jaw and the frost gleaming in his eyes. He wears the austere garments of a judge, black and understated, but there is no underestimating this man's position, for it is something that emanates from the rigid set of his shoulders and the penetrating gaze Kanda has had the misfortune of experiencing firsthand. Kanda's eyes flicker past the old man to the nondescript wooden door at the corner of the room, behind which all the records of cases lesser Arbiters all over the world have settled are stored. There exists only one key to that door, currently hanging from a pendant around the Arbiter's neck.

Kanda knows the truth. Lavi's goal is not truly to be the next Arbiter, but to be the possessor of that key.

Arbiter doesn't even glance up before saying, "Where is my idiot apprentice?"

Kanda tears his gaze from the door and steps forward, "Gunshot to the shoulder," there is no need to add anything else, since were it anything serious, the conversation would have begun very differently, "This is for you, sir," he hands over the envelope, which Arbiter opens and studies closely, eyes flitting across the pages. Kanda has seen the letters Lavi writes to Arbiter before and cannot discern any recognizable language from it, not that he'd know much with his Japanese and half-hearted English. The world of the Arbiters is another, separate and very selective.

Finally, Arbiter raises his eyes to Kanda's, "And you, boy? How goes your mission?"

"As well as can be expected, sir."

"Will you make your deadline?"

Kanda's gaze becomes steel, and his voice cuts through the air with no hesitation, "Yes."

The corner of the Arbiter's mouth quirks upward, "Good luck, then."

0o0

Kanda opens the door with intention, marching back into their flat with a good mind to bitch Lavi's ear off about sending him _there_. But when he peeks over the couch and finds the redhead sound asleep with a sheet of paper haphazardly tucked between his hand and stomach, the rest of the pile in a flurry of white on the carpet, Kanda lets his shoulders drop fractionally in resignation. He reaches out, notes Lavi's temperature is nearly back to normal and sighs, grudgingly admitting relief. He sheds his coat and tosses it over Lavi, hoping he'll get tangled in it and choke. It would certainly make up for all the other crap he's gone through today thanks to him.

0o0

"Allen, stop feeling guilty about it!" Lenalee says for the fifth time that day, lowering the sheet she is hanging to dry to glare half-heartedly at Allen. It's hard to be mad at the boy when he mopes so convincingly, but he's also completely wrong.

"But you slapped him, Lenalee! In the face! Twice, almost!"

"And he almost killed you," she retorts, flicking the end of the wet sheet to straighten it out before clipping it up to dry. The line hangs heavy with the weight, and from the corner of her eye she sees Allen's dejected figure tossing a ball, Daysia's, she notes, up in the air over and over.

"He thought I took it," Allen adds morosely, eyes never leaving the rattling ball, "And I provoked him."

"You have such a ridiculous guilt complex!" Lenalee fumes, the tendons in her forearms bulging as she wrings the sheets desert-dry. Usually, she thinks it's beautiful, it's a sign of a pure heart, of Allen's infinite goodness, an admirable characteristic. So she usually doesn't call him out on it. But all she can think of is the hideous bruise, now a mottled, grayish-green, underneath Allen's scarf. No one treats her family like that.

Allen's guilt about the whole business allows her to overlook the fact that Allen has not given a second thought, much less a twentieth, to any of his clients in several years.

0o0

They leave for France.

Kanda follows Lavi, idly watching his lips move in unfamiliar patterns as he sweet-talks the gossipy old men and women that run the market stalls. The air is still light, the sun's rays morning-pale and providing just enough warmth to offset the faint chill left over from night, but not enough to feel hot.

Lavi talks, throat working gutturally and voice rising in peculiar pitches as he seeks to gather information. Some of the old women nod eagerly, making Lavi's body lean forward with the inklings of hope in his eyes and Kanda's attention to focus back on the conversation. But inevitably, the people shrug and Lavi sighs and gives them a hearty goodbye as they walk off through the crowded streets in search of other informants.

"So they've all seen him, but they don't know anything?" Kanda bites out, feeling restless from this fruitless and boring search.

"They _think_ they've seen him," Lavi corrects, tugging a freshly-harvested green grape from its cluster and popping it in his mouth, making a motion for Kanda to take one as well. Kanda shakes his head, and Lavi continues, tongue working around a full mouth, "It fits the description perfectly, except for one thing, which is the markings on the forehead. Shit!"

Lavi jumps to the side to avoid a pile of horse manure, while Kanda calmly steps around it, wrinkling his nose in mild distaste, "Can't he be wearing a hat?"

Lavi rolls his eyes, "You don't think I asked that already? I'm the brains of this team for a reason, Yuu," Kanda scoffs but doesn't deny it, "It may be that he has a way of hiding it. I mean, he can apparently walk through walls," Lavi rubs his head, the first hint of frustration seeping into the lines wrinkling his forehead. His hand moves to his shoulder, rubbing gingerly, "Damn, the soreness is almost as bad as the bullet itself."

"It will lessen within the week," Kanda mutters absently, watching the people bumping, burbling and hovering around them. How many of them are dark souls, hiding under the guise of good small-town citizens?

"You're thinking something creepy again," Lavi whines, pulling a lock of Kanda's hair, "Stop it."

Kanda scowls, lips pursing as he focuses back on Lavi, "What would you know?" Lavi shrugs and walks ahead, boots scuffing the ground carelessly. Kanda follows, stepping quickly to catch up to him, "So what is your plan now, genius?"

Lavi pops another grape in his mouth, making a wet crunch when he bites it. Kanda studiously avoids looking at the juice glistening on Lavi's lips, "There's an inn nearby, where some of them said they'd seen him. Presumably, that's where he was staying. So that's the next best place to investigate."

They arrive at the inn a little before lunch, so Lavi decides it's a good idea to buy lunch from the inn, warm themselves up to the bartender and his cute daughter, who brings them their lunch.

Kanda chews slowly, "How did you know to come here?"

Lavi blinks, pork-laden fork halfway to his mouth, "I told you, I found out from a witness. They told me he mentioned this town."

"But how did _they_ find out? A member of the Noah Clan would not be careless enough to tell a witness about his next step of action."

"It was a bit of a fluke, really," Lavi says, putting bits of carrots on his fork and pretending to aim at Kanda.

"I'll kill you."

"As if, you—"In a flash, Kanda has the tip of his sword pressed against the side of Lavi's thigh under the table. Lavi gulps, "—are completely right, I was just being facetious. Please let me keep my leg."

Kanda sheathes his sword again, and sips from his water, "You were saying?"

"Um, right. Like I said, it was a fluke. We got lucky. I mean, you've seen the crime scenes, I am convinced this guy has got to be bipolar or something."

Kanda nods, remembering. There had been several incidents where, were it not for a few bits of unmistakable evidence, they would have said that there were two different perpetrators. Sometimes, every potential witness within the area had turned up dead, sometimes they had all been left alive, even when it was obvious he had known they were there.

"Anyway, so we got lucky. He was in a good mood, and apparently—how did I not tell you this? I was sure I'd told you."

"You just told me we were going to France. You'd stayed up through the night, and obviously got these news while I was out training. When I got back you were too tired to give me more than a 'France, next week,' if I remember clearly," Kanda says.

Lavi scrunches up his nose, "Oh, now I remember. Right, so he was in a good mood and left the witness alive. According to the witness, while he was rummaging through the room, he suddenly slapped his forehead as if remembering something and said, 'Damn skin,'—whatever the hell that means,— 'I forgot I have to go to La Baule'. I'm assuming the reason he didn't kill the witness was because he said this in French, and auspiciously enough, our witness speaks French, which he surely wasn't expecting. So that's why we're here," Lavi suddenly looks thoughtful, worrying his lower lip, "I also assume he's no longer here, since the townspeople haven't seen him in a couple of days, so that's good, but I'm a bit worried about what will happen when we finally run into him."

Kanda snorts, and says very simply, "I run him through with Mugen."

0o0

Allen wakes up with a start, mouth open and dry as he pants for breath, blood pulsing almost painfully through his limbs. He nudges his legs apart, trying to relieve some of the discomfort brought upon by the image of coal-dark hair enclosing them like a drape and onyx eyes boring into him with the impassivity of a mountain.

He's not sure whether he's glad or not to be having dreams again.

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**Hahaha, but Allen won't be the only one having some problems to take care of :) **

**Thanks for reading! And for my reviewers, thanks again for taking the time to review. Your reactions and thoughts are always fun to read. **


	9. Deprivation

**Thanks for actually sticking with me on this. I know I'm such a slow writer, and I'm seriously working on it! D: In any case, enjoy all the crazy UST in this chapter.  
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_**No Backing Out Once Inside - 9   
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Allen wakes up, mouth open and dry as he pants for breath, blood pulsing almost painfully through his limbs. He nudges his legs apart, trying to relieve some of the discomfort brought upon by the image of coal-dark hair enclosing them like a drape and onyx eyes boring into him with the impassivity of a mountain.

He's not sure whether he's glad or not to be having dreams again.

0o0

Fingers kneading, gripping, bruising, making love to his collarbone while a tongue laps persistently, languid like a tiger, teasing, treacherous, dragging the sensation along while his stomach muscles seize under the ministrations and he chokes for want of moaning. There are drums, beating to no particular rhythm and yet his body twitches in unison with them, while he tangles his fingers in threads of fleece-white hair, pulling, snagging, holding on to them as he pants. The drums grow louder, more erratic, and the warmth on his stomach disappears, his hands sliding out of the unruly mess of silver hair as metallic eyes rise to watch him darkly underneath eyelashes that look to be powdered in flour. His swollen lips open just in time for the drums to crash and break—

And then Kanda wakes up.

His first thought, naturally, runs along the lines of _what the hell_. His second, as he realizes uncomfortably that the weight pressing down on his stomach and the fingers bruising his chest were nothing more than hormonal machinations, is _why the hell were there drums?_

The answer becomes immediately apparent when he hears a garbled noise in the hallway and another crash, and them a smattering of unsteady booted footsteps that resound deep along the wooden floor. Ah. There is a drunkard staggering around the hallway outside. Damn Frenchmen and their wine. Kanda sits up slowly, mind disentangling itself from the dream slowly, like pulling gum off the bottom of a shoe. But the residue remains, leaving him dry-mouthed and aching, unable to shake flashes of silver from the corners of his gaze and phantom touches trailing lower and lower each time.

He scrambles stiffly out of bed to seek out fresh air.

0o0

It makes no logical sense. Lavi peruses his files, eyes trailing lazily over the words that have been irrevocably imprinted in his mind since the first reading. They have been trailing this man for a year now, and nothing about him seems to make sense. The Noah Clan has always been known more for what isn't known, but Lavi had somewhat conceitedly assumed that he would be able to break this case within a few months, at best. He's reluctantly given up that notion, but he's sure that given enough time, they will slip, and he will catch them. It's become nearly a matter of pride by this point.

He takes a bite of porridge when the door opens, and he looks up with the spoon still in his mouth.

"'Ey, Yuu," he swallows, looking Kanda over before adding, just for kicks, "Well, you look like shit."

"…Hn," Kanda shoots back cleverly, thoroughly disappointing Lavi and dropping into the chair across from him, where another bowl of porridge has been sitting patiently. His hair is pulled tightly around his scalp, but the roots look damp. Lavi wishes he'd just left it messy and undone, but of course, Kanda hates looking any sort of disheveled. Lavi loves that look on Kanda though, after he's just finished his morning routine and a few strands fall in front of his face, softening the sternness of his eyes.

"Eat up," he makes an unnecessarily twirly gesture at the porridge, "It's fabulous. Though it might not be hot anymore. You took really long with your morning training. Couldn't find a spot?"

He pauses his prattle to wait for Kanda to grunt something in response, which he does after a length of time but otherwise seems to be quite content (in that eternally cross and surly Kanda-esque way) staring at his bowl. Maybe even more cross and surly than usual, even.

"It won't bite you."

Lavi counts mental ellipses in his head before—

"Hn."

"Well, what bit you on the ass this morning?" Lavi crosses his arms, rolling his shoulder to ease some of the stiffness, and crosses his ankles on the table, pouting, "Woke up on the wrong side of the bed?"

Kanda does risk a sharp look up at that, and Lavi is slightly taken aback by the darkness of his eyes, a primal tint whirling in those orbs. The look is too brief for Lavi to decipher it, but it's not the sort of primal furor for violence that floods his eyes when he fights. This is something different, but Lavi knows he knows it, feels it is familiar and seeks the train tracks that lead to the answer. But it currently escapes him, and he has more pressing matters on his mind, so Lavi decides to keep an eye on it, but otherwise let it be.

0o0

Unfortunately, it won't let _him_ be. Lavi prides himself in being a pest of the worst kind, and in purposely driving Kanda up the wall. It's fun. But he's definitely _not okay_ with the reciprocation, hypocrisy be damned. The sad thing, of course, is that Kanda is not even aware of it, which means he gets more points. They have this mental, unspoken contest going on, and Lavi is determined to win. Totally.

But Kanda has been nothing sort of a nuisance all day. His mind is clearly elsewhere, and while it's not something particularly obvious to most, Lavi _knows_ Kanda. The day before, Kanda had done nothing more than follow Lavi along uselessly and stand behind him while Lavi prattled off in French and tried to collect information. Today is not so different, but while yesterday Kanda had been avidly observing their surroundings, today his eyes focus on nothing and continue writhing in that same unidentifiable way that they had earlier that morning, familiar and yet unknown to Lavi. There is a restless energy that bristles around Kanda, like he's covered in those little electromagnetic waves Lavi's been reading scientific reports about, making Lavi tense and just pretty much driving him up a wall. And then there's that little rhythmic metallic click as Kanda flicks his thumb to unsheathe his sword just an inch, then pushes back down to re-sheath it. Lavi was at first surprised, since fidgeting just was _not_ part of Kanda's decidedly limited set of human characteristics. Now he's just about driven mad by the incessant little noise.

"Stop _doing_ that," Lavi hisses, when the current lady he'd been interrogating (and subtly flirting with) gives Kanda and his sword a worried look as she meanders away. Kanda takes a brief moment, ostensibly to process the statement, and glares.

"I'm not doing anything."

"Right, and I'm just wantonly choosing to get angry."

"It's your damn fault for being too sensitive, Arbiter."

Lavi has had enough. He pulls Kanda into an empty alleyway, moldy stone arches and uneven walls that provide a momentary shelter from prying eyes, and shoves him against the wall, grabbing him by the front of his shirt, "That doesn't even make sense, this has nothing to do with sensitivity! You keep staring off into the distance, and you're so distracted I've had to repeat myself every other sentence. And for heaven's sake, leave your sword alone! And that's not a metaphor!"

Then Kanda looks straight at him, gaze flickering briefly to his lips, and Lavi realizes that maybe it _is_ a metaphor after all.

"What…" Lavi swallows, recognizing what it was that had been lurking in Kanda's eyes earlier, and why he hadn't realized it before. It was want, _need_, and while Lavi had seen that before from Kanda, never to this extent. Never so intense and so _tangible_. Lavi opens his mouth, intending to continue his sentence, but he realizes he's forgotten it, and as Kanda continues looking at him with that same dark fire in his eyes, the air cracks and they're at it.

Bruising and desperate, and Lavi has the one brief thought of _Thank goodness we picked this place_ that's immediately wiped clean by Kanda's tongue pushing against his and Kanda's fingers digging into the small of his back and the decadent dark little noises Kanda is making deep in his throat. God, he loves Kanda like this. But that begs the question: why _is_ Kanda like this?

0o0

Across the English Channel, Allen is doing only marginally better (he doesn't have a stick up his ass like Kanda, after all).

"Oi, you're not paying attention," Daisya snaps, grumbling as he wriggles his fingers in front of Allen's face. Allen blinks and raises a hand smothered in skin-tone cream.

"What?"

"You're spacing out on me," Daisya grumbles, clearly not happy with the lack of attention Allen is bestowing on him. Daisya gets testy like that. Allen has the odd thought that he'd never fit with someone like, say, Kanda. He purses his lips as he realizes he's had yet another thought about _that guy_. He's been trying to get his mind off his dream all day, but it's only ended in him being distracted and antsy. And actually looking forward to tonight's work, if only to vent some of the coiling and uncoiling churning in his gut.

"Um," Allen eloquently responds. He slathers the cream all along his left arm, meticulously rubbing it in and smoothing it out until it looks nearly as normal as his right arm.

"Um? That's it? Pox-marked bastard," Daisya mutters good-naturedly and leans forward until his nose almost touches the mirror, squinting to inspect his kohl-lined eyes. Allen is glad they don't have to do more than bathe and perfume themselves, unlike the women. When they were younger, the early evenings were the most boring part of the day because everyone went into their rooms to prepare themselves for their clients. Allen, Daisya and Lenalee were often left to their own devices, which in hindsight wasn't all that bad, but it wasn't rare for them to spend the time in Komui or Miranda's room and watch them put on their make-up and prepare themselves. Komui would (and still does) tell them outrageous stories. Miranda taught Lenalee about make-up, a woman's sword and shield. On a whim, she'd also taught Allen and Daisya how to line and paint their eyes—while Allen hadn't much cared for it, Daisya had taken a definite liking to it. Allen had to admit it fit him, especially now with his tattoos.

"Don't forget your neck," Daisya adds, and Allen glances at the mirror to note that yes, the bruises are still there, and it might be wiser to cover those up as well. He runs a careful finger down them, remembering both the excruciating pain as well as the gripping pleasure those fingers were capable of and then rolls his eyes and steers his thoughts to the here and now. Daisya watches, eyes hooded in a way that Allen knows means anger, "Does it still hurt?"

Allen shrugs, pressing slightly to test— Ah, yes, there it is, "Not really."

A sudden wailing breaks out somewhere down the hall, and Allen and Daisya exchange glances. Daisya hops off his stool and peeks his head out the door to call out, "What's wrong this time, Miranda?"

"That's not nice. This is the first time in a long while," for which everyone is grateful. Nobody could stand the constant wailing and screeching when she'd first come, though no one could blame her either. It's about respect— anyone who finds themselves in a place such as this does so only after running long and desperately through many twisting paths and dead ends. But she'd found her legs eventually, and began to take her lot in life more gracefully, and that is why Allen gets up to poke his head into the hallway too.

Daisya's mouths turns upward in a smile that is equal parts wistful and resentful, "You know I can't help it. Reminds me too much of my mother."

Allen remembers that as well. It wasn't until years after it had become mere water under the bridge that Daisya had confided in him that the reason he hadn't liked Miranda at first was because her wailing and moaning reminded him too much of the mother he'd ran away from.

"I'm going to see what's wrong," Allen says, leaving Daisya to shrug and return to his makeup.

He makes his way down the hallway, already hearing the baritone rumbles of Komui's reassuring voice. It slides open as he approaches, and Komui's profile appears, still turned toward Miranda.

"We'll certainly take care of it, Miranda, so just finish getting ready and don't worry," he's saying as he exits the room. Komui is one of those people that if Allen hadn't grown up with him and seen the extent of his kindness and devotion to his family, he would be scared shitless of. His eyes are always steeped in cunning a shade too dark for mere warning, even as his mouth spouts off inanities and never seems to be lacking an exaggerated twist. He's the kind of person you can't take seriously, but if you ever _don't_… well. But he has, for all intents and purposes, become like a second father to him.

"What's going on, Komui?" Allen asks, after Komui closes the door behind him, Miranda's sniffles still faintly audible from inside, "Is she okay?"

"Ah, Allen. Good afternoon," Komui smiles at him and places both hands on his shoulders, adjusting the collar of Allen's shirt and giving him an approving once-over, pausing momentarily to inspect his neck, "Looking good today. I said you could take another day off if you want to, though. Sure you don't want to take it?"

"Definitely," Allen immediately and though Komui raises an eyebrow, Allen isn't really willing to elaborate on why he's so eager he can barely restrain himself from checking the clock every few minutes in hopes that it'll move faster towards business hours.

"Well, with that enthusiasm in mind, there is some shuffling that will have to be done in order to accommodate Miranda tonight. I'm having Ray look into that, but be aware your client might change tonight."

"That's fine," Allen nods.

Komui smiles again at him, pats him on the head affectionately —"Take care of Miranda for me, will you?"— and goes downstairs, presumably to sort things out with Ray.

Allen raps the door with his knuckles, waiting until Miranda croaks out a hoarse 'come in' before entering. Miranda, for all her good-nature, has always been a rather gloomy person, and her room reflects it. There is a broken clock in a corner of the room that she's affectionately dubbed her countdown to doomsday. It sort of works, in sporadic moments that feed her paranoia. Her room is mainly a study in neutral colors, dark curtains, beige bed-sheets, but she always tries to have a vase of fresh flowers on the nightstand, and her mirror is framed with colorful ribbons, courtesy of a ten-year-old Lenalee. On her dresses lies a carefully folded letter and her bottles of perfume.

"Hey, Miranda. I just wanted to check in on you," Allen smiles, and Miranda, sitting on the bed with her hands folded around a handkerchief in her lap, sniffles miserably and squeaks out a hello.

"What happened?"

Miranda sniffs and wipes her eyes, smearing kohl across her pale feature, and digs her toes into the floorboard nervously, "I'm sorry, I shouldn't be this upset, I'm not meaning to cause a scene, I just—"

Allen laughs gently and sits next to her, a woman who is a little bit like a surrogate mother or older sister, "It's alright Miranda, none of us mind. You want to talk about it?"

Miranda sighs and bunches up her handkerchief into an increasingly smaller ball, "I just have a problem with my client tonight."

"How come?"

Miranda's lip trembles slightly, "He's from my hometown."

"Ah," Allen blinks in surprise. He can certainly see why she's so upset now, "You don't think he'd recognize you though, do you?"

"I don't know, but even if he didn't, all I'd be hearing would be all those insults they threw at me, and all those horrible, horrible words the children sang, and," her voice breaks, and she raises the handkerchief to warble into it, shaking.

Allen leans against her, wrapping an arm against her side, "It's alright, Miranda, you know Komui wouldn't let you go through that. One of us will take him."

Dark, smudged eyes turn to give him a watery smile, and she returns his one-armed embrace, pulling him more comfortably against her side so that he can lean his head against her shoulder and she can reach up and comb her fingers through her hair as she used to do when he was smaller and fit more easily.

"Yes, I know. Thank you, Allen," she says, her voice still shaky, but that nasal edge to her voice is gone.

"I'll miss you when you're gone," he says suddenly. He wants to resent that Lavi guy, but it will be good for Miranda to start a life of her own finally. It's what they're all hoping for—to save enough money to buy themselves out or be bought out by someone. Miranda has found that, and Allen has to be happy for her.

"I know," her voice sounds strained again, and Allen almost regrets bringing it up, "I will too." She strokes his hair for a bit longer before finally pushing him away slightly, "Now, go and finish getting ready, and thank you for coming in."

0o0

He's finishing his meal when Lenalee comes into his room, make-up done stunningly and hair crafted into a bow held by various hairpins and ornaments, "Allen, I'm taking your client tonight, and you're taking Miranda's."

"Yeah? Well, tonight I have the short blonde guy who like to play footsie."

"Oh, him? Didn't you tell me he's a hair-puller?"

"A little, if you want him to stop get him to concentrate on something lower. I sometimes just grab his hands."

"Alright," Lenalee says, sitting in one of his chairs and taking his juggling rings to play with, "Miranda's taking my client, but I've never had him before, so I don't know how she'll do with him. Ray thought it would work out best like this though, and he's not been wrong so far, so it should be alright."

"Does Miranda know anything about her guy?"

Lenalee shrugs, letting the rings slide from one elbow down her wrists and all the way to her other elbow, "Nothing that would be helpful for us. She did say that at least he's good-looking. Really nice black hair."

"Oh," Allen says. _Black hair_, "That's nice."It probably won't be as nice as what's-his-face… Kanda, that's right. But man, it would be nice if it was as long and soft…

"What are you spacing out about?" Lenalee asks with a raised eyebrow, and Allen gives her his sweetest smile, which she knows is synonymous with his most devious.

"Oh, just how to make it as memorable as possible."

* * *

**Okay, so this chapter just seems like a whole lot of nothing, but.... we had to establish emotional connections, right? And I wanted Kanda to fall prey to Allen's allure. That'd be sure to frustrate him. :)  
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	10. Reencounter

**Dear me. Well, here's another chapter. Didn't think I'd finish this thing in the middle of finals, but somehow I did. And this was supposed to be out a month ago, but I had some computer issues and I lost all of the new chapter I had written. So... well. I'm not quite as satisfied with the rewrite as I was with the original, so tell me if there's any parts that feel awkward or don't make sense for the characters and such. **

**So for all those who are still with me... Enjoy!

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**_No Backing Out Once Inside - 10_  
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Allen knows something is off, different. It's in the way he closes his eyes and lets his mind sink into hedonism, in the way he moans uninhibitedly and his hands flex and reach as if searching for something. Where before he used to lock his mind away and immerse himself in the physical, in the hands and the warmth and the friction of damp skin against damp skin, now he lets his mind actively participate in the process, imagining that the hair he pulls is darker and longer, and the skin he licks is a touch paler. His regular clients notice, drawing away with a puzzled narrowing of their eyes, but they don't make mention of it. This is not a place for heart-to-hearts; it is a place of catharsis of the filthiest kind.

"You must be crazy to enjoy it this much," Lenalee often says, but that's not quite right. It's not that he enjoys it, per se, but that he understands his role and knows how critical it is. He throws himself headlong into his job because he sees how much he is needed. He sees the broken marriages and the loneliness, the stress of the business world and the isolation of money and prestige, the insecurity behind the arrogant faces and the desolation behind the smirking, lustful faces. They come to him in a vain attempt to fill a certain void in their lives, and Allen sees their need and wants to help.

Allen is not a saint, far from it, and they are not either, but their souls flicker and writhe in front of him, screaming and crying, the proverbial wailing and gnashing of teeth, and with his body he is able to ease their pain a little. But even so they beg and plead with him to make it stop, to help them, to cleanse them. They ask it of him, the only one who can see them in their revolting, pitiful entirety. But that is something that no matter how hard he tries, and God, he's tried, nearly killed himself trying… he can't. He cannot save them, and he knows it isn't his fault, but the guilt shreds his insides anyway. And that is why he cannot, _will not_, let himself get caught up in his clients, why he must lock their names and faces away in a little box in the corner of his mind and forget about it during the daylight hours. He feels insanity bubbling under the lid and just hopes it won't pop.

It has been years upon years since he's been mentally engaged while attending his clients, and though on the one hand, it is not with _them_ that he's engaged, he's certainly plunging into it with renewed vigor. He doesn't know how long it will last, however, since he will eventually have to get over this person. Allen may be optimistic, but he is not naïve. He has no illusions of ever meeting Kanda again.

**0o0**

Kanda is the most uncooperative human being that ever existed, Lavi decides as he sulks and glares at the window. Lavi has begged, whined, prodded, sung, chirped and made every kind of noise imaginable to get Kanda to talk to him —particularly about what happened in the alleyway—but Kanda refuses to even give him the time of day with a snotty upturn of his nose or a heated glare, which, to add insult to injury, earns Kanda at least two points, if not three. So, Kanda won't talk to him, Lavi's shoulder is still tender and painful, he can't stop thinking in French, and even worse, they weren't able to find anything definitive on the Noahs. Lavi is in a very, very bad mood, and he looks around the train cabin in hopes of finding something he can throw at Kanda and maybe set him off. It'd even the score. Maybe. Depends on what Lavi throws.

Kanda's reflection ghosts over the scenery flitting by them, not quite sulky like Lavi but definitely pissy and completely closed off. But he's much calmer now, the fire in his eyes tapered down to glowing embers, though Lavi can still feel the barest brush of that scalding energy swirling under Kanda's skin. At least that infernal clicking of his sword is gone. To be honest, Lavi had expected to have a three-inch incision right below his Adam's apple now, but after their little tussle in the alleyway, Kanda has been mum on the matter, and more importantly, has not threatened Lavi's life. Which means that he does not see Lavi as the perpetrator of that little incident but instead sees _himself_ as the one to blame. Regretfully, hell will freeze over before Kanda will let Lavi into what had prompted him to lose control like that.

Oh, but what a rewarding loss of control it had been. Lavi closes his eyes and remembers the feel of Kanda's mouth, aggressive as usual but with a sense of urgency and need that had been exhilarating. Lavi slits his eyes open, slouching in his seat and stretching his legs out before him to make himself more comfortable as he watches Kanda and lets his memory play out in perfect detail those few moments.

After a few moments, Kanda turns his head as if realizing the scrutiny—_Oh, he finally responds to that, does he_? Lavi thinks huffily, and proceeds to throw his sweaty bandana at Kanda.

The disgust on Kanda's face as he flicks it to the side is worth two points, at least.

**0o0**

Kanda hates the Monday market, particularly when he is running late and finds himself stifled by the morning crowd. On most days he is ahead of them, but last night had found them busy with another job and so today had witnessed a bit of a later start than usual for them. Or for him, at least. Lavi is still sleeping, as always. Kanda can't remember the last time Lavi got up at a reasonable time. The excuse, of course, is that he stays up until late poring over records and evidence, but Kanda thinks that's a bullshit excuse, since he could get up early and go to sleep early just the same. Lavi usually just says that Kanda doesn't know how to appreciate the night life, to which Kanda always replies that Lavi doesn't know how to appreciate the absence of Mugen in his face.

He hefts the bag in his hands into a more secure position, and thinks about tonight's dinner. He has their daily supply of bread and has the meat for tonight's dinner, and wonders what else he should get. He dodges through the amicable chatter of merchants and buyers, the air ripe with the sweet smell of fruits and the heavy odor of meat and from the docks, the unmistakable tang of fish.

Apples, he decides, as he walks by a crateful. He reaches out to grab one, bypassing a hand hovering in useless deliberation over which one to pick.

"Hey!" the person says, and Kanda glances up, ready to lash out with a _Not my fault you're so slow._ His mouth is open, tongue poised, when he catches sight of chalk-white hair framing smooth skin. He freezes, and his brain decides to choose that exact moment to take a vacation.

He stares, completely boggled, at Allen, who is standing right in front of him with a surprised, nearly pleased expression on his face. Kanda keeps on staring for a couple seconds that turn into several, and just when it's becoming absolutely pathetic how he can't seem to come up with anything to say or even _move_, Allen bursts out laughing. Presumably at Kanda's face, but Kanda's not willing to put money on that.

He remains frozen, but his brain supplies awe at how _simple_ Allen's laugh is. Simple and uninhibited, and it crinkles his eyes into mere slits through which he can only barely see a glint of silver. Kanda swears that when his brain gives him motor function back he will kick this kid's ass for laughing at him.

"You don't have to look that surprised," Allen finally breathes, still chuckling as he wipes the corner of his eye and smiles good-naturedly, "Though I didn't think I'd ever meet you again, much less here of all places."

Kanda's brain graciously allows him to say, "…What are you doing here?"

Allen frowns slightly, "We're not nuns, you know," he pauses as he realizes what he's said and hurries to add, "I mean, of course you know, but what I _meant_ is that we don't live cloistered away. We can go out if we want to."

_Nuns?_ _Cloisters?_ He uses a lot of religious imagery for a whore, Kanda thinks absently. Lavi would probably say it means the kid has some redemption issues. Kanda wouldn't know; he's not the one who's studied psychology, after all.

"Anyway, I always come here in the mornings to get food and stuff for the others," Allen continues happily, "Oh, what do you have there, is that for stew? You know, what'd go great with that isn't _green_ apples, you should get _red_ apples. Those are great this time of the year."

Kanda tunes out the kid's prattle fairly quickly, while his brain deliberates whether it will allow him to do something more than gape like a fucking idiot. At least his mouth is closed. Kanda's eyes travel from the slim, gloved tips of Allen's hands up a long-sleeved black coat, hood drawn over his head, most likely to ward off unnecessary attention due to his hair. Kanda realizes that this is not the first time he's seen this particular hood, and upon consideration can recall seeing it at the market before, usually passing it on his way back home. It is ironic that they had been frequenting the same place for so long without noticing. His eyes linger on the bold red pattern ingrained on his face, and he does wonder, does it have any meaning, the way his does? Under the coat he can see a vest fitted tightly around a chest that Kanda knows from firsthand experience is deceptively slim-looking. His eyes flicker down, past long, slim legs that he's spent countless nights now remembering the feel of, wrapped around his hips. He shifts his weight uncomfortably to his other foot and feels the restlessness he'd just barely begun getting under control rise again.

This is what he does not understand. Kanda is, despite all contrary appearances, human. He's felt lust before—Lavi has been on the receiving end of that more times than Kanda cares to admit. But Allen… Allen is completely different from Lavi. Lavi, despite all his jibes and the idiocy, is relatively passive and unobtrusive. He has partnered with Kanda and become his foil, countering the acid stares and bit out remarks with nary a blink. He just _is_, sits there patiently, figuring Kanda out little by little through his silent observations, without the need to poke and rile Kanda (to a certain extent, at least). He has melded into the background of Kanda's life and become an everyday phenomenon, never prying too deep, never pushing too far, just accepting Kanda as he is and molding to him. And that is why Lavi has been able to get to points previously unexplored by another other human being. Lavi just _is_.

Allen just. Isn't.

He does not let Kanda be in peace, he questions and challenges and pries and asks, even with his silence, and he clearly feels entitled to doing it without a shred of tact. Kanda would love to write it all off as lust, something that he can, through sheer will power, tame. But it hasn't been just lust—Kanda remembers the anger he felt when he thought his bracelet was stolen, remembers the stomach-gnawing guilt after he'd hurt him, the flare of irritation at every other word the boy says, the _fascination_ he's been accosted with, and it is hard for him to forget all those emotions through sheer will power. Who _is_ this Allen Walker, to affect Kanda so? And that is the main difference between Lavi and Allen. While Kanda can reluctantly admit that he does in fact have something resembling concern for Lavi, maybe even affection, he inspires nothing like this bizarre barrage of emotions that he can't pinpoint, can't gather and quantify, but still feels. These past days have been filled with a torrent of frustration at his inability to push Allen out of his mind. When he succeeds in keeping his thoughts from straying, it is his dreams that stray instead, to the point that he has given insomnia serious consideration. It's like water simmering in a pot, and just when Kanda had thought that he'd turned the heat down by controlling his thoughts, offering the whole affair a chance to cool in due time, Allen runs into him, and strikes the match again. He fucking hates serendipity.

At that point, he tries to walk away. A part of his brain (he assumes. Nothing else should be involved in his decision-making, after all) snarls _You just found him. You want him. Are you going to just walk away?_ But Kanda's nothing if not stubborn, and people? He has no need for them.

Apparently though, Allen is just as fucking clueless and unaware of social cues as Kanda is stubborn. When people walk away, especially without saying anything, that's usually a sign to leave them alone, not to…

"Are you _following_ me?"

Allen opens his mouth with a devious glint in his eyes, then appears to think better of whatever offhand comment he was about to make and shrugs, "I have some free time, and nothing else to do."

"Well, go find someone else whore yourself out to," Kanda grits his teeth.

Allen looks mildly put-upon for a moment, "Hey, if this is about the bracelet thing, I'm sorry, okay? I didn't mean to make you mad."

Kanda snorts and tries to sidestep him, and that seems to be enough for Allen to catch onto the fact that Kanda is composed of maybe not as much bite as his bark indicates.

"Do you always have a stick up your ass?" he says overtly sweet and maybe just a touch mocking. It's a fine line, really.

"Do you always like having one up yours?" Kanda bites back.

Allen's face changes lightning-quick, thunderous clouds darkening it as he suddenly steps in front of Kanda.

"You don't fool me," he says dangerously, leaning close, and even though Allen is so much shorter than him, and he seems so inoffensive and naïve, there is something lurking in his eyes that speaks of mettle stronger than the average person's. Kanda briefly wonders where it came from. They stand in the middle of a winding little alleyway, the kind favored by European cities: narrow and with the walls looming above them, leaving only bits of the sky to peek from between opened shutters and clothesline hanging heavy with wet clothes.

"You were supposed to be just a customer," Allen begins, hand reaching tentatively to fist Kanda's collar. His fingers may be hesitant, but his words are careful and deliberate and his eyes rise to meet Kanda's with a spark of steel, "One night and then gone. But you keep coming back. You keep appearing over and over," Allen tugs briefly on Kanda's collar, and Kanda's hand rises automatically to grab his wrist in warning. Allen ignores it and presses on, silver eyes boring into Kanda's as he says, "It's a sign."

"It's _coincidence_," Kanda corrects.

"Right, you'd be one of those types," Allen sighs softly, but, devious little twit, as opposed to that being a sign of relenting, he instead pushes himself a little closer to Kanda, enough for the cold air between them to be chased away and leave only a strip of skin-hot air between them, "Think what you will. It's a _sign_. I didn't think I'd see you again and I'm…" his voice trails off for a moment before he seems to regain his courage and finishes with, "I'm not going to let you go just like that."

Kanda growls, but before he can open his mouth to tell this kid to shut the fuck up and leave him the hell alone and maybe unsheathe Mugen for added effect, Allen repeats, "You don't fool me. You want me, just as much as I want you."

Kanda doesn't know where he gets the gall to say something like that. To _assume_ something like that. Because there's no way he knows. No way that it could possibly show. But unfortunately, that seems to be the bottom line. Allen kisses him, sudden and rough, pressing him against the uneven stone wall behind him, and Kanda… Kanda lets him. Allen is good. Allen knows what he's doing. Kanda can't really say anything for himself, but he considers Lavi to be a good authority on the subject, and Lavi generally approves of Kanda. And yet, despite the fact that they're both experienced – hell, that it's not even the first time they've done this— it's still foreign, and makes Kanda's stomach knot up for some strange reason. In the middle of the day, with no urgency, no reason, no money having passed hands between them, Kanda suddenly doesn't know what to do. Does he shove Allen off him and denounce this whole thing, like he should? Or does he put his hand on his waist? Does he pull him closer? (Oh, how he wants to do that, thrust his hips up just a bit, feel his tongue suckle the sensitive skin of his neck…)

"Come tomorrow night," Allen whispers, running his tongue along Kanda's lower lip, "I'll save a slot just for you."

"I'm not going back to that place."

"If you're afraid," Allen begins, and at Kanda's glare corrects himself, "Okay, if you're _concerned_ about Lenalee and Ray, don't worry. They're really nice people, they'll forgive you if you just apologize and play nice, it's— Oh. I see where the problem is."

"I'm not going to pay money to have sex," Kanda says. That's only one step above being _paid_ to have sex. Kanda may not have much moral ground to stand on, what with killing people without the slightest consternation and working for an organization that oftentimes works outside of the boundaries of the law. But he has his pride, and no matter how enticing this Allen Walker may be, Kanda is not giving that up.

"Consider it on the house," Allen says, sidling up to Kanda and pressing his body in one long, hot line against his, "to make up for the whole mishap with the bracelet. Besides," he adds, wriggling his hips against Kanda's and making Kanda suck in a sharp breath, "you really should take advantage of this offer, you know. I'm worth way more than what your friend Lavi paid to buy Miranda."

He reaches up to nip Kanda's lip, but Kanda goes suddenly still.

"What?"

"What what? You don't believe me?" Allen frowns, "I'm pretty good, you know. I'm worth a lot of—"

"Not that, you moron," Kanda snaps, "Lavi bought her?"

Allen blinks, letting go of Kanda and sliding back down from the tips of his toes, "Yeah, he didn't tell you?"

Kanda doesn't respond, instead shoving Allen away and turning heel to stalk furiously out of the alley.

* * *

**Finally, so AllenxKanda, right? Right? I know you guys were waiting for that little hint. But there's more, I promise. Finally moving this thing along. For those of you still reading this, thanks, I really appreciate your stamina! And I'm sorry I'm such a slow writer. :/ **


	11. Elucidation

**Umm... no excuses other than life. But I really appreciate the incredible reviews I've gotten for this story, especially because they reminded me to go back and look over it again! As some of you mentioned, while it's great to have a slow-building story, it is tending to drag a little, so after this chapter, things will start picking up - not only for your sake, but in hopes that I'll actually finish it that way!  
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**Enjoy!  
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_**No Backing Out Once Inside - Elucidation  
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Underneath the anger and indignation, Kanda still feels his body's longing to regain the heat that had been pressed against it only seconds ago. It begs to turn around and go back to Allen. Kanda tries to convince himself that doing so is as bad an idea as it was for Orpheus to look back at Eurydice.

Right now it is easier, as always, to nurse his anger and not his longing. He lets it seep into his bones and rattle his mind in search of a diatribe to express the flurry of emotions —thoughts, he corrects himself— that are going through his head. First and foremost is outrage.

How dare he. How dare he buy that woman.

o0o

Lavi rolls over, smacking his mouth open and closed a few times to clear it of the stale taste of whatever he'd eaten the night before. He feels the gnawing of hunger and the lull of warm blankets warring to decide whether he should stand and find leftovers from Kanda's breakfast or get a few more hours of sleep. His shoulder is still not back to speed, he reasons, but then rolls his eyes at his own laziness and with a heavy sigh shoves the covers off himself, pausing to scratch at the side of his jaw where a bedbug must have bitten him during the night.

He stretches experimentally, testing the limits of his injured shoulder's mobility and is glad to see the vast improvement from, say, a week ago. He runs a hand through his hair to ruffle it into something other than the fresh-out-of-bed look, goes through his business in the bathroom and spends a good ten minutes looking for a clean set of clothes when he sees the basket of clean laundry Kanda placed at the foot of his bed. He's infinitely glad Kanda isn't around to gloat over him and chide him for his less-than-stellar hygiene habits. In retaliation for being _so_ much better than him at domestic duties, Lavi accidentally stumbles against Kanda's bed and rumples the covers. Ha. That'll teach him.

He wanders into the sitting room and flops down on the sofa out of sheer habit, eyes immediately lighting on the exact word he'd left off the night before. They've been solving cases and tying up loose ends for Arbiter here and there, but the one thing that still eludes him is this whole business with the Noah's. At this point, Lavi _knows_ he's gone through every piece of evidence he's gotten his hands on, and he has found nothing. He hates to admit it, but there's not much left for him to do other than take a step back and wait for them to make another move.

Lavi hears the stomping and creaking of the wooden floorboards in the hallway, the abrupt muffling as the steps fall on the doormat almost at the same time as the doorknob rattles with the key. His brain has enough time to think _Oh shit_ before the door is shoved open, weakened hinges squeaking and pulling apart slightly, and then in the doorway is Kanda, in all his righteous fury.

His hair has become a bit mussed from the doubtless hurried trip, a few strands loosening behind his ears, and his chest heaves. His teeth are gritted, canines looking particularly sharp and pointy. Lavi doesn't have to look at his eyes to know that he is well and truly pissed, and that Lavi is in some deep, deep shit.

"Why hello, dearest K—" he tries, raising a hand in jaunty salutation before Kanda cuts him off.

"You," he snarls, hand trembling above Mugen's hilt as if barely holding back. "You're a shady guy. Anyone associated with the damn Arbiter is hardly to be trusted, but this is a new low even for you."

Lavi's mouth drops open without any dignity. It's a combination of Kanda's words, the suddenness of it all, and most importantly, Kanda's eyes. There is something lurking behind the surface, avoiding exposure. It's so blatantly there, but Lavi can't put his finger on it, even though it makes him want to reach out to Kanda. "Were you ever planning on telling me? I suppose this is how you keep a partner 'informed', isn't it?"Acid drips from Kanda's voice; cold, righteous anger coats words meant to cauterize. "Even if this is your own damn business, it changes everything. I'm not going to sit by and take this underhanded, sleazy scheming from you."

What _is_ it? It's driving Lavi crazy. Half of his brain is trying to decipher Kanda's words, the other half is trying to decipher his eyes. Whatever it is in there, it makes Lavi happy and sad at the same time, and he begs his subconscious to slow down a little so he can pinpoint what it is that he sees. Kanda steps closer in the room, body tense as if a gunshot had just been fired. Lavi tries again, "Yuu—"

"Are you planning on just having her live here with us? Will you need some _privacy_ at night?"

Lavi blinks. "Her? _Her?_"

Realization dawns, and with it, everything clicks into place. Kanda's eyes—what they harbored was betrayal. Betrayal and hurt and insecurity. All because—

"God, Yuu, _no_. She's not—I'm not—" Man, Lavi sucks at words when he most needs them. "It's _definitely_ not what it seems."

Kanda stills imperceptibly at that. His fingers twitch above Mugen, his stance wary and ready to lash out again if need be. He says nothing, but inclines his head at Lavi with narrowed eyes, the motion clearly bidding him to speak.

"I didn't tell you because it had nothing to do with you. She's for Arbiter. Miranda—she's got some abilities that make her invaluable to our interrogation process. So I asked her to work for us." Lavi's eye begs Kanda to believe him. "She's not for me, jeez, you know me well enough to know I'm not into people ownership or hell, even monogamy. What would we even _do_ with a woman in the flat?" Lavi chuckles, almost weak with relief at having identified the source of Kanda's ire.

Kanda remains immobile, processing Lavi's words and taking his time to accept them. The fire in his eyes dwindles to uncertainty, and Lavi watches him suck in a breath that spreads through his whole body and loosens it just a notch.

"So… you've never…"

Lavi raises an eyebrow. "Slept with her? Hell yes, every time I visited. But she's never been 'mine', even if that is a perception I let slide at the brothel precisely because it was the perfect excuse to keep on visiting and making plans. She's great though, sweet girl, Arbiter will have fun training her."

Kanda frowns. "You didn't deem it necessary to tell me because it's Arbiter business." Lavi nods. Kanda tsks and rolls his eyes. "Don't make that mistake again." Then he cocks his hip and puts a hand on it, demanding, "So what is this ability?"

Lavi grins, leaning back on the couch with his hands interlaced behind his head. "You're not gonna believe this, Yuu. If it weren't for my spankin'-awesome observational skills and memory, I would have never caught it. So, as you know, sometimes I get a little caught up in the excitement of, well, I'd say use your imagination but you don't really have one, so—"

"Would you get on with it?"

"Right, so as you know, I like to throw things—well, it was the oddest thing. The small pillow I'd had right next to me all of a sudden was in the corner of the room. I'm talking about from one second to the next, and I _hadn't_ thrown it, and neither had she, and that was my first clue that there was something odd going on." Kanda's giving him a look that is equal parts wary and curious: not quite sure where this is going, but intrigued at least. Lavi leans forward to scratch absently at his ankle. "It didn't happen all that often, but here and there—something at the foot of the bed would suddenly be a few inches off in another spot, or the clock would jump forward a minute or two."

"What are you saying?" Kanda looks confused.

Lavi leans forward, his eye shining. "Oh, c'mon, Yuu! You can't figure this out?" he's milking the suspense for all it's worth. "I just gave you the clue… things suddenly changing positions with no explanation, the clock skipping forward…"

Kanda opens his mouth and closes it. Then opens it again. "She can knock you out momentarily?"

Lavi deflates like a wilting flower. This is why Lavi's the brain of the pair. "Really, Yuu? You think I wouldn't notice that?"

"Well, what _other_ logical explanation is there?"

"What if it's not logical? Or at least, not based on what we consider possible."

Kanda's eyes narrow and he strokes the hilt of his sword pensively. "You're bluffing."

"Yuu, I swear to you upon my mother's hopefully non-existent grave—"

Disgust jumps across Kanda's face. "You have absolutely no respect for even the most important things in your life," Kanda hisses.

Lavi grimaces. "Not funny? Alright, yeah, that was a little tactless, I probably shouldn't joke about that. It's not like it makes finding her any _less_ important, you know."

Kanda gets them back on topic. "You're saying she can fuck with time? Is that what you want me to believe?"

Lavi drops all the humor like a load of lead has been attached to his face. "I confirmed it. I confronted her about it and then we ran various tests to figure out the extent of its abilities as well as its limitations."

Kanda starts like he wants to stand up and storm off, but instead he crosses his arms and goes to lean against his reading chair, which means he's in this for the long haul.

"Explain."

Lavi does, in full detail. Kanda has to wonder how they tested all of this. "Well, it seems she can essentially control a spherical radius of roughly five feet and control time at will within it. She retains complete control and awareness of what transpires in that space, but the people affected by it only remember the last series of events that occur within the space. Time continues naturally outside of that area, which explains the jump in time when you come to, so to speak. Though, the center of the sphere is more or less the subject, or subjects, since we tested it in plural as well, or whatever she is concentrating on. As in, if I try to step outside the perceived area of control, it follows me, and I can't get away from it. On the other hand, if she's focusing on something else as her subject, I can step fully in and out at will, but there is no gradient of control, which is just as well, as I can't imagine what would happen if half of my mind was going forward and the other half backwards." He laughs a bit at the idea, and the break in dialogue allows Kanda to catch that his mouth has fallen open. He shuts it quickly and grudgingly acknowledges that Lavi probably gets a point for that.

"She can only hold it for six to seven minutes, depending on the radius she is controlling, and can manipulate time forward, backwards or even hold it still, all relative to the subject, of course. Also, things that occur to the subject during the time manipulation can't be undone, even if you go backwards in time, because as soon as she releases control, it will come back." At Kanda's confused frown, Lavi elaborates, "If she bites me, and goes back in time to before she bit me and then releases her control, the bite mark will reappear, even if I don't remember it. Physical changes persist. She had to be pretty careful not to get noticed by doing something, going backwards to change something in her routine, and forget that she'd inflicted a mark, or vice-versa."

Kanda twitches slightly in discomfort at the image of Lavi conducing these 'tests', but he supposes that there are more important things at hand.

"It sounds too good to be true. An ability like that would be—"

Lavi waggles his finger and Kanda, and Kanda glares at the offending appendage. "Ah, it's true, it seems just miraculous and all-powerful, right? But I mentioned all those limitations. You can't undo physical changes – so you can't save someone from getting shot, for example. It only lasts a few minutes, and within a very small range. So it's really not this all-powerful power. Still." His face turns serious again, eyebrow dipping down. "It's particularly handy for one thing. Interrogations. Think about it – oftentimes, we rely on luck. Will phrasing it this way strike a nerve and get the perp to talk? But by asking it as such, we end up revealing our hand, and once we do that, we can't go back. If we could go back in time and repeat the question a different way, we might get another answer, go down a different path and get different results. And we could use those results to get even further down another path."

Kanda takes a moment to think about Lavi's words. It's true – sometimes you have to try revealing your hand— _we know your buddy-so-and-so said you were going to the docks tomorrow night _will only work once, after which you can't go back to another tactic and pretend you don't know anything. Kanda grunts as the full realization of how useful this ability is. He looks up at Lavi with raised eyebrows and says rather dryly, "Well, Arbiter should be pleased."

Lavi grins widely, and yeah, he might be just a bit proud of his find as well. "But this has an even bigger implication," Lavi says, pressing the tips of his fingers together as he glances at the table, where the notes about the Noah are still sitting there, constant nuisances that cackle at him and goad his intelligence and detective skills. "If people like her exist, who can bend the rules of nature… who is to say that these legends about the Noah – that they can change appearances, or walk through walls—aren't true as well?"

"So you're saying we're possibly up against supernatural beings?"

Lavi nods gravely. "It's the only way everything that doesn't _fit_ fits."

Kanda's smirk is razor sharp, and he strokes Mugen again lovingly. "I've always liked a challenge."

Lavi grins in response and rubs his hands together. This is a whole other ball game now.

o0o

When Lavi thinks about it, the situation is hysterical. Kanda had thought that Lavi had a bought a prostitute because he'd fallen in love with her! But no, instead of laughing, Lavi had been frantic to clear up the misunderstanding because Kanda… Kanda had been hurt.

After dinner, Lavi usually goes back to his research, and Kanda takes the time to do the dishes. Today Lavi joins him, which is not terribly rare, but Lavi's sure by the long-suffering sigh Kanda utters when Lavi steps beside him that he suspects an ulterior motive.

Though they have running water, like nearly all flats in London nowadays, even in the summer it's never warm enough to wash anything, and with winter getting closer and closer every day, the water is downright frigid. Kanda takes the pot of water he's had sitting on the stove throughout dinner and puts it in the sink, dipping a coarse woolen cloth in it. Lavi watches, close enough so that their elbows touch and he can smell the leather of Kanda's coat, as he scrubs their tin dishes and rinses them with the hot water. When he hands it to him, Lavi takes the plate and dries it thoroughly to put away in the cupboard.

"Um, so, Yuu…" Kanda's face turns a fraction of an inch towards him, which in Kanda-speak means _You have my full attention._ Lavi proceeds. "You know you're the only partner I'll ever need," Lavi begins. Kanda groans and dunks the mug in the water with more force than necessary, bits of water splashing both of them.

"We are _not_ talking about this," Kanda mutters, turning his face away from Lavi. Despite that, he's completely still, not even the natural swaying of a body at rest, and a glance at his hands in the murky water shows them pale and white, gripping the mug tightly. Lavi remembers Kanda's eyes, the hurt and fear in them earlier that day and he needs to say this just as much as Kanda needs to hear it.

He leans forward, trying to catch Kanda's gaze. "Look, I didn't mean to make you think that." He doesn't say, _You totally freaked when you thought I was bringing someone else in here to potentially replace you._ _You were afraid of being alone again, and uncertain of your place, and hurt that things could change without any warning, and you didn't know how to say any of that because you're have the communications skills of a nun with vows of silence_. Instead, he says, as earnestly as he can, "No one can replace you. We've got too much to do, and no one is going to distract us from it. After all we've gone through together, Yuu, I won't ever _want_ anyone else around me. I _need_ you." It's rather too close to the truth for Lavi's comfort, but Kanda won't see that, so it's alright for him to say it.

"Will you stop saying such ridiculous things?" Kanda grouses, bending down to scrub at the dishes with more force than strictly needed.

"I'll think about it. Embarrassing you is one of my most finely-honed skills, but I need practice to keep it so." Lavi grins, more or less satisfied with the slight pink tinge of Kanda's exposed neck, and turns back to his masterful drying.

"So you think I'm untrustworthy?" he hazards a few minutes later.

"I wouldn't trust you further than I can throw you," Kanda replies without even glancing up.

"Well, you're a pretty strong guy—"

He's pretty sure the plant on the windowsill wilted a little from Kanda's glare.

o0o

"You left without even saying goodbye yesterday."Allen hops down from the crate he was sitting on, hood almost falling backwards. He tugs it back securely around his head so that it covers his hair again and trots a couple steps to fall into line with Kanda. For his part, Kanda isn't sure how he feels about Allen meeting him at the morning market. He briefly considers changing his route, but this is where he finds the artisans that make the bread he and Lavi like, the cheapest fruit, and the only shop that sells the sword polish he requires for Mugen. Damn.

"If you expect me to make small talk like bureaucrats and oligarchs then you better get your head out of your ass and look at the real world."

"Well that's a good note to start a relationship with," Allen sighs all-sufferingly and aims an exaggerated plead for help at the sky, complete with fingers interlaced in prayer.

Kanda turns around slowly, noticing his suddenly-slack jaw and replacing it with a sneer. Anything to hide the sudden panic that shot through him. "Relationship? There is no _relationship_. What kind of candy-coated world do you live in?"

Allen looks hurt for a moment, shoulders hunching and face beginning to close up, and then a little frown worms its way onto his face and he looks at Kanda more closely. Kanda tenses and draws back.

"Right," Allen says, nodding once. His eyes soften, at what, Kanda has no idea. He breezes past Kanda with a wicked smirk and shoots back, "I agree. This is purely physical, of course."

"Damn right," Kanda answers automatically, and then stops. Allen keeps on walking, a hooded figure with sharp hips and thin, strong wrists matching slim, booted feet. A figure that haunted his dreams in France and muddled his head with memories of the metallic glint in his eyes and the snarls of his mouth, the strength and constant pushing and pulling of his words.

It _is_ purely physical… isn't it?

* * *

**You all deserve kittens for your patience. I will be genuinely surprised if any of you guys actually read this after all these years.  
**


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